Unfortunately, the 2001 winner was J.K.Rowling's Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I say unfortunate, not because it is said it won largely on the back of uninformed voters, but because after reading the first three (on occasion I thought I'd read four - for a reason which will shortly be obvious - but on seeing that the Goblet of Fire is large enough to beat whales to death I realised my error) I'd become tired of that which even the notoriously NPOV Wikipedia has to term “a very strict formula” and which I call “same fucking plot”.
The plot in question is a fairly simple one too. Each year, after suffering through living with his lower class guardians, orphaned upper class scion Harry Potter is allowed to return to the exclusive boarding school where he's finally able to once again handle the all-powerful money and play Rugger.
Wait... what? I'm doing what? Sorry... I'll try that again:
The plot in question is a fairly simple one too. Each year, after suffering through living with his muggle guardians, orphaned wizard scion Harry Potter is allowed to return to the exclusive boarding school where he's finally able to once again handle the all-powerful magic and play Quidditch. During this time, his enemy Voldemort - who is, astonishingly, even less enamoured of the mudbloods than most of the wizarding world - tries with no great success to kill Potter. Towards the end of the book, Potter will accidentally confront Voldemort and, through judicious use of various dues ex machina, foil his plot.
Goblet doesn't vary much from this... if at all. After an opening scene from some 50 years prior where the muggles are portrayed as venal, suspicious wretches who summarily find guilty an innocent man - “S'far as I'm concerned, he killed them, and I don't care what the police say” - Harry Potter awakens from a dream or vision wherein his arch-nemesis Voldemort plots his demise and casually kills the aforementioned innocent man with a glance. Harry is (of course) living with his muggle guardians - the Dursleys - who hate him and all he stands for. Compared to earlier books, Harry's having an easier time. This is largely down to the previous book where he helped spring his godfather, Sirius Black, from prison. Black is innocent of the crime he was put away for, but no-one apart from Harry and a couple of others knows this - so Black is on the run. Harry is still able to contact him though, and uses the threat of calling down the “multi-murderer” Black on the Dursleys to ameliorate some of their abuses.
Harry uses this threat to good effect when he persuades his uncle to let him go off with his friends Hermione, Ron and the rest of Ron's family to see the Quidditch World Cup. Good old Harry the Hero: “let me go to the game, or I'll tell my psychotic friend I'm unhappy.”
There's more fun at the world cup. Rowling's on record as saying that the “Potter books in general are a prolonged argument for tolerance, a prolonged plea for an end to bigotry,” but almost all of her wizard character show an amazing lack of regard for the muggles - there is such ignorance of them that high-ranking wizards get common terms confused - calling policemen “please men” for example. Within the confines of Hogwarts, there's little clash between the worlds, but to cater for 100,000 wizards watching an international Quidditch game (which, incidentally, is a terribly designed sport - it's as if the prime goal was 'make it so Harry can still win even if the other side has been cheating/is much better') has the wizards renting some fields from a farmer.
Muggles aren't allowed access to magic of course (because, I don't know... it would be a benefit or something, and that would be bad), so the wizards are supposed to refrain from using it around the farmer as he takes cash on the gate. However, even excluding the infamous Death Eaters (crazy name, crazy Voldemort supporters) who really fuck the guy up later, most of them can't seem to keep their wands in their robes and the farmer has been having his memory wiped “ten times a day” to stop him getting suspicious.
Harry and co. arrive at the game via a portkey, an item which will have importance later. They're basically fixed teleport spells tied to any object. To prevent the muggles using them (fast transportation being of little use, presumably) they're sometimes disguised as rubbish, only work at certain times and are put in remote locations.
With the Quidditch out of the way, events move on to Hogwarts where the Triwizard Tournament will take place. This is a competition between three of the wizard schools to find the best student wizard by setting three difficult tasks, one per school term, for the best pupil from each school involved. Harry is too young to take part, so nothing happens and the book ends here.
Ha... just kidding. Someone sticks his name in the pot (or goblet of fire), under a fake school name, and suddenly there are four entrants for the competition. The judges uhm and ah and eventually decide he can't take part, so nothing happens and the book ends here.
Kidding again. There's some sort of compact formed and he'll have to take part anyway. The date of the first test is announced - but not what it is. Which isn't as big a problem as it could be, because Hagrid the giant almost immediately tells Harry he'll have to “fight” a dragon to steal one of it's eggs. And one of his teachers (one “Mad-Eye” Moody) suggests he use his famed m4d Quidditch skillz to do it, which he does.
The egg, when obtained, turns out to be a clue to the next task. Harry pretty much ignores this until one of his fellow competitors, as a “thank you” for hints about the previous test, tells him to have a bath with it. Even then, it takes one of the school ghosts to give him further hints about what to do, and Dobby the house-elf (under instructions from Moody, as it turns out) to give him the plants he can take to breathe underwater for an hour to do the task.
Fortunately, no-one has to cheat to help Harry find out about the third test; all four contestants are shown the maze and told the Triwizard Cup will be in the middle - first to touch it wins. As it happens, both Harry and his fellow Hogwarts entrant (Cedric, if you were interested - doesn't have much of a role in the book, apart from being the minor character who's death was built up as a big thing in pre-release marketing) arrive at the same time. In a spirit of magnanimity that Harry will regret and Cedric would really regret, but not for his almost immediate death, they decide to touch the Cup at the same time. It turns out to be a portkey (see... said it was important) which transports them both to Voldemort, who orders Cedric slain (oh noes, major character death... not) and then explains his plan to Harry: he needs some of Harry's blood to get his body back.
Once re-incarnated, Voldemort challenges Harry to a duel. However, unbeknownst to Voldemort, his and Harry's wands share the same source and, unbeknownst to both (but not, presumably, to the jack-in-the-box god in the machine who's popped up again) this means when Voldemort zaps Harry, his magic goes backwards, and all the spirits of the people he's killed escape from the wand. The distracts Voldemort enough for Harry to make his escape.
Back at Hogwarts, “Mad-Eye” Moody reveals himself to be one of Voldemort's minions in disguise and explains he helped Harry so he'd get to touch the cup first and be transported to Volders.
Which is where this whole thing falls apart really. The entire plot of getting Harry into the Triwizard Tournament was to get him to touch the cup, which had been turned into a portkey. But a portkey can be anything, so surely could have been achieved far more simply by sending Harry a parcel or something.
Oh, then Moody tries to kill Harry, but is stopped by Dumbledore ex Machina.
There's probably more that annoys me... but it's getting on for 3AM now.
Also, I was reading the adult edition, so there's no excuse that's it's a children's book.