Previous Winners

2024 RIMSBA Winner: 

Frizzy by Claribel Ortega

Marlene has a hard time going to the salon with her mom every weekend to straighten her "unpresentable" curly hair. With her aunt's help, she learns to embrace the curl, care for her hair, and discovers that all hair is good hair.

2023 RIMSBA Winner: 

Hide and Seeker by Daka Hermon

Sixth grader Justin's best friend, Zee, has been missing for over a year and mysteriously returns acting very strange. At a party for Zee, his friends play hide-and-seek but then weird things happen, like a mysterious mark on the player's wrists which leads to their disappearance. An evil seeker pulls the friends into a world where their worst fears come to life. Zee managed to escape, can his friends escape too?

2022 RIMSBA Winner: 

Dress Coded by Carrie Firestone

Dress Coded, is a podcast, a protest, and powerful. Molly is making eight grade girls voices heard. These girls are protesting the sexualizing of their bodies by the school administration’s dress code. It's biased and unfair and everyone is going to know about it.


2021 RIMSBA Winner: 

Allies by Alan Gratz

June 6, 1944: D-Day. As the allies invade Normandy in the hopes of defeating the Nazis, nine voices, ranging from a teenage American soldier to a French-Algerian girl working for the Resistance, tell their gripping stories of what happened on a day that changed the course of World War II – and the 20th century – forever.

2020 RIMSBA Winner: 

Game Changer by Tommy Greenwald

Teddy Youngblood gets injured and falls into a coma after football practice. Teddy’s family, friends, and community wants to know if it was just an accident - or was it done on purpose? Readers are able to follow along with the characters as they unravel the mystery of what really happened on that fateful day.

2019 RIMSBA Winner: 

Restart by Gordon Korman

Eighth grader Chase Andrews fell off of his roof and suffered total amnesia. When Chase goes back to school, he is torn between old football loyalties and new video club friends. Is once a bully always a bully or can he truly RESTART his life?

2018 RIMSBA Winner: 

Orbiting Jupiter by Gary D. Schmidt

Joseph, a father at age 13, has never seen his daughter, Jupiter. He is placed in a foster home in rural Maine where he meets 12-year-old Jack. Together, they discover the true meaning of family and sacrifice.