Mrs White (Lead Practitioner – English) and I had the pleasure of hosting the discussion and voting event for the Portsmouth Book Award (Longer Novel), in Springfield Library on 14 May.

This annual event, organised by the School Library Service, was established in 2001. It is an award for the best paperback fiction book from a shortlist of four titles, published within the year, and the winner is decided solely by the participating pupils from schools across Portsmouth.

From an original longlist of thirty titles, the following were selected for the shortlist under consideration by the judges this year:

‘Electric Life’ by Rachel Delahaye

‘Wintour’s Game’ by Brian Dungan

‘Running Away For Beginners’ by Mark Illis

‘Thunder City’ by Philip Reeve

The lively discussion, by participants from Years 7, 8, 9 and 10, covered aspects such as a successful beginning; character development; a believable storyline; a satisfying ending and the chance for reflection on any issues the book might have raised. A lot of insightful comments were made by the team, and although the old adage states that ‘You should never judge a book by its cover’, (and the artwork on the covers was not something that was taken into account), it did cause a lot of amusement when one of the judges commented on the fact that the cover for ‘Running Away For Beginners’ reminded her of a toilet roll unravelling! When the votes were counted, this title came a very close second, and the favourite for the Springfield team proved to be ‘Thunder City’. This fantasy adventure is part of the ‘Mortal Engines’ series, but knowledge of the series is not required to enjoy this book.

The celebration event will take place on 18 June, and it will be interesting to see if Springfield’s choice is reflected in the votes from other schools.

Mrs Williams, Librarian