YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction

Recipients

2020

• Free Lunch by Rex Ogle

• The Great Nijinsky: God of Dance by Lynn Curlee
• A Light in the Darkness: Janusz Korczak, His Orphans, and the Holocaust by Albert Marrin
• A Thousand Sisters: The Heroic Airwomen of the Soviet Union in World War II by Elizabeth Win
• Torpedoed: The True Story of the World War II Sinking of "The Children's Ship" by Deborah Heiligman

  2019

• The Unwanted: Stories of the Syrian Refugees, by Don Brown.

• Boots on the Ground: America's War in Vietnam, by Elizabeth Partridge.
• Hey, Kiddo: How I Lost My Mother, Found My Father, and Dealt With Family Addiction, by Jarrett Krosoczka.
• The Beloved World of Sonia Sotomayor, by Sonia Sotomayor
• The Faithful Spy, by John Hendrix

2018

• Heiligman, Deborah. Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers.

• Aronson, Marc and Marina Tamar Budhos. Eyes of the World : Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and the Invention of Modern Photojournalism.
• Leatherdale, Mary Beth and Lisa Charleyboy. #NotYourPrincess: Voices of Native American Women.
• Sandler, Martin W. The Whydah : A Pirate Ship Feared, Wrecked, and Found.
• Slater, Dashka. The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives. .

  2017

• Lewis, John and Andrew Aydin. Illus. by Nate Powell. March: Book Three.

• Blumenthal, Karen. Hillary Rodham Clinton: A Woman Living History.
• Davis, Kenneth C. In the Shadow of Liberty: The Hidden History of Slavery, Four Presidents, and Five Black Lives.
• Osborne, Linda Barrett. This Land Is Our Land: A History of American Immigration.
• Turner, Pamela S. Illus. by Gareth Hinds. Samurai Rising: The Epic Life of Minamoto Yoshitsune.

2016

• Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War by Steve Sheinkin

• Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson
• Enchanted Air: Two Cultures, Two Wings: A Memoir by Margarita Engle
• This Strange Wilderness: The Life and Art of John James Audubon by Nancy Plain

2015

• Popular: Vintage Wisdom for a Modern Geek by Maya Van Wagenen

• Laughing at My Nightmare by Shane Burcaw
• The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia by Candace Fleming
• Ida M. Tarbell: The Woman Who Challenged Big Business -- and Won! by Emily Arnold McCully
• The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights by Steve Sheinkin

  2014

• The Nazi Hunters: How a Team of Spies and Survivors Captured the World's Most Notorious Nazi by Neal Bascomb

• Go: A Kidd's Guide to Graphic Design by Chip Kidd
• Imprisoned: The Betrayal of Japanese Americans During World War II by Martin W. Sandler
• Courage Has No Color: The True Story of the Triple Nickles, America's First Black Paratroopers by Tanya Lee Stone
• The President Has Been Shot! The Assassination of John F. Kennedy by James L. Swanson

  2013

• Bomb: The Race to Build - and Steal- the World's Most Dangerous Weapon by Steve Sheinkin

• Steve Jobs: The Man Who Thought Different by Karen Blumenthal
• Moonbird: A Year on the Wind with the Great Survivor B95 by Phillip Hoose
• Titanic: Voices from the Disaster by Deborah Hopkinson
• We've Got a Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children's March by Cynthia Levinson

  2012

• The Notorious Benedict Arnold: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism, & Treachery by Steve Sheinkin

• Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom and Science by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos
• Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition by Karen Blumenthal
• Wheels of Change: How Women Rode the Bicycle to Freedom by Sue Macy
• Music Was IT: Young Leonard Bernstein by Susan Goldman Rubin

  2011

• Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing by Ann Angel

• They Called Themselves the KKK: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
• Spies of Mississippi: The True Story of the Spy Network that Tried to Destroy the Civil Rights Movement by Rick Bowers
• The Dark Game: True Spy Stories by Paul Janeczko
• Every Bone Tells a Story: Hominin Discoveries, Deductions, and Debates by Jill Rubalcaba and Peter Robertshaw

  2010

• Charles and Emma: The Darwins’ Leap of Faith by Deborah Heiligman

• Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream by Tanya Lee Stone
• ' by Phillip Hoose
• The Great and Only Barnum: The Tremendous, Stupendous Life of Showman P. T. Barnum by Candace Fleming
• Written in Bone: Buried Lives of Jamestown and Colonial Maryland by Sally M. Walker