Media and English blog

The Carnegies are long-running UK children’s book awards – they recognise outstanding reading experiences for writing and illustrating in books for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Illustration is the award for an outstanding book in terms of illustration for children and young people. More information is available on the Carnegies web page.

In the library we are fortunate to have a number of the books which have won this illustration award in recent years.

• Becker, A. (2023) The tree and the river (winner of the 2024 prize)
• Nguyen, T. and Zdung, J. (2023) Saving Sorya: Chang and the sun bear
• Pinfold, L. (2011) The black dog
• Reynolds, J. and Novgorodoff, D. (2020) Long way down: the graphic novel
• Smith, L (2017) There is a tribe of kids
• Smith, S. (2019) Small in the city

We encourage all illustration, design and creative writings students to borrow and read the books.  Explore them to discover the style of illustration, how the stories have been written and how the illustrations enhance the stories. 

…. and who knows, you could be a winner in future years!

“The Carnegies are the UK's longest running and best-loved children's book awards, recognizing outstanding reading experiences creating through writing and illustration in books for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Writing is awarded by children’s librarians for an outstanding book written in English for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Illustration is awarded by children’s librarians for an outstanding book in terms of illustration for children and young people” (Source: The Carnegies).

The shortlist for both awards have been released and may be of particular interest to our staff and students linked with our BA Creative and Professional Writing programme and design programmes.

(Image sourced and used with permission https://carnegies.co.uk/2025-longlists-announced/)

Are you keen to get stuck into reading for your assignments? 

Check out the latest books bought for the School of Media and Creative Industries - books we have recently bought for programmes within the School are listed here. 

It is a rolling list so gets updated each time we buy new books, so there is always something exciting for you to discover!