Alligator’s Mouth Award 2025 – Shortlist Announced!
15 May, 2025Now in its seventh year, the shortlist for the Alligator’s Mouth Award 2025 has been announced. The award was set up by independent children’s bookshop The Alligator’s Mouth and The Bright Agency to celebrate the best highly-illustrated children’s fiction titles for 6-8-year-olds, championing both authors and illustrators.
The shortlist was selected by a judging panel of children’s book experts, including last year’s winners Philip Reeve and Sarah McIntyre and children’s author Mariesa Dulak, who commented: ‘It’s an exciting time to be judging the Alligator’s Mouth Award because of the abundance and variety of engaging young fiction that’s around right now. Every book on the shortlist uses different layout, style to entice the reader. It really is a cracking shortlist.’
Tony West and Margaret Wallace-Jones, co-founders of the award added: ‘The 2025 shortlist is another fantastically varied list of colourful, funny, puzzling, engaging and inventive stories that will help any child become an enthusiastic reader. Congratulations to the authors, illustrators, editors and design teams behind these excellent books.’
Award partner Coram Beanstalk are running a competition that offers three UK schools the chance to win a set of this year’s longlisted titles. The competition runs until 2nd June.
Congratulations to all the shortlisted authors and illustrators!
The 2025 Alligator’s Mouth Award shortlist:
Rabbit and Bear: This Lake is Fake! written by Julian Gough, illustrated by Jim Field (Hodder Children’s Books).
Gordon the Meanest Goose on Earth written & illustrated by Alex Latimer (Oxford University Press).
Murray and Bun: Murray the Viking written & illustrated by Adam Stower (HarperCollins Children’s Books).
Beti and the Little Round House written by Atinuke, illustrated by Emily Hughes (Walker Books).
Supersquirrel and the Crazy Rain Maker written by Russell Punter, illustrated by Josh Cleland (Usborne Publishing Ltd).
The winner of The Alligator’s Mouth Award 2025 will be announced at a special awards ceremony at the beginning of July. Watch out for our winner announcement.
For more children’s book awards, click here.
