PUPILS from Southbroom Junior School will be among those nominating their choices for Wiltshire's favourite books of the year at a special event at Devizes Library next Wednesday.

The young critics are presently working their way through a pile of short-listed books, including Pizza On Saturday by Rachel Anderson, Cloud Bursting by Malorie Blackman and Heartbeat by Sharon Creech.

They will tell experts why they support their favourite books and why they should receive either the national Carnegie Medal for an outstanding book for children and young people or the Kate Greenaway Medal for outstanding illustration.

The short lists have been drawn up by a group of Wiltshire librarians from all the children's books published in 2004. The children from Southbroom Junior and Fitzmaurice Primary and Christchurch Primary, Bradford on Avon, will join with teachers, librarians and literacy professionals to nominate four books for this year's Carnegie and Greenaway medals.

The guest speaker will be Barry Cunningham, managing director of Chicken House Books, which publishes the work of children's authors Cornelia Funke and Kevin Brooks.

The day will finish with the adult professionals voting on their favourite two books in each category, after hearing from the school children which are their favourites and why. Their nominations will go forward with others from across the country for the final assessment and the two winners will be selected by librarians in July.

Last year's Wiltshire winners were The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night by Mark Haddon and Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo in the Carnegie section and The Witch's Children and the Queen by Ursula Jones and Russell Ayto and the Woods by Christopher Wormell in the Greenaway Medal category.