Atheneum Books for Young Readers

About Atheneum Books for Young Readers

Atheneum Books for Young Readers is the children's and young adult imprint of Simon & Schuster that continues the children's list of Atheneum, the New York house founded in 1959.

Atheneum was founded by Alfred A. Knopf Jr., Simon Michael Bessie and Hiram Haydn; Knopf left his family's firm to do so. In 1961 the editor Jean E. Karl was recruited to build a children's book department. Atheneum merged with Charles Scribner's Sons in 1978, after which the Scribner children's list moved into Atheneum. Scribner merged with Macmillan in 1984, and Simon & Schuster has owned the Atheneum lists since buying Macmillan in 1994. The Atheneum Books for Young Readers name was created by Simon & Schuster.

The imprint has a strong award record. E. L. Konigsburg's The View from Saturday (1996) won the 1997 Newbery Medal, Cynthia Kadohata's Kira-Kira (2004) won the 2005 Newbery Medal, and Nancy Farmer's The House of the Scorpion (2002) won the National Book Award for Young People's Literature and later Newbery and Printz Honors. The Higher Power of Lucky won the 2007 Newbery Medal, and the Olivia picture books began on the list in 2000. Earlier Atheneum children's titles include Bunnicula.