THE SMOOCHIES!* *ARE NOW CLOSED! Award VLOG Ceremony on February 14! Thanks for playing!!!

The Printz, the Newbery and the Morris have been awarded, so let's get down to less serious literary business: THE BEST YA KISS OF 2009.


The infamous Josh Berk (DARK DAYS OF HAMBURGER HALPIN) and I are hosting the 2009 SMOOCHIE AWARDS!

*Warning: some of the comments contain KISSING spoilers! But they are more like TEASERS. For me.

Eligibility: A YA novel published in 2009 with an awesome kissing scene.

Like this. Only from a YA novel.

That's it!

You think that's fun, wait for this.
There are THREE CATEGORIES.

BEST REALISTIC KISS (from a realistic novel either contemporary OR historical)
BEST OTHERWORLDLY KISS (from a fantasy novel--high fantasy or urban fantasy or dystopian)
BEST KISS OVERALL (best kiss involving a mix of humans/vampires/faeries whatever--EVERY KISS! )

Get it?

Good!

You can nominate ONE kiss in EVERY CATEGORY

So your nomination, in my comments below, will look something like this:

BEST REALISTIC: Heidi & Josh in the Banana Shack/THIS WOULD NEVER HAPPEN, SORRY RAD SHAUN/by Josh Berk and Heidi R. Kling
BEST OTHERWORLDLY KISS: Max the Martian and Uma the Half-Unicorn/WORST PREMISE EVER/by Rainbow Sharknose
BEST OVERALL KISS: Frank and Tinker Bell by the lockers/I USED TO HATE HIGH SCHOOL BEFORE I FELL IN LOVE WITH A FAERIE/ by Jon Battlebeam

Except, of course, your examples are from REAL BOOKS PUBLISHED BY REAL AUTHORS IN 2009!

OUR VOLUNTEER CELEBRITY JUDGES are all POPULAR TEEN reviewer/bloggers whose names I won't reveal at this time to protect their privacy. NO AUTHORS are on the PANEL of JUDGES. We'll go with MAJORITY RULES if there are a bunch of the same nom in one category. JUDGES will be used as TIE BREAKERS.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

THE WINNING AUTHOR will be announced via a SPECIAL AWARD CEREMONY on VALENTINE'S DAY!