InterWorld by Neil Gaiman and Michael Reaves

Now, anyone who knows me knows that I'm a ginormous Neil Gaiman fan. So it would be really easy for me to say "Oh, this book is fantastic, he should WIN!!" just to try to get him to come to Spring Institute and get the opportunity to pick him up from the airport. And probably never return him.

And it is a really cool sci-fi book -- kid must travel along alternate universes with alternate versions of himself in order to save all the universses -- that does not dumb down in the least. I was really impressed by the passing references -- if a reader did a wikipedia search on all the asides, they could come away with an impressive sampling of knowledge of math, physics, philosophy and art. But it's basically a really fun, well-executed read that just didn't make me jump up and down enough to want to give it an award. A reluctant NAY from the woman who desperately wants to someday stand in an airport holding a sign that reads "Mr. Gaiman."