By Joel Goldenberg
The Suburban
The second annual Roslyn and Max Margles Young Writers Contest, honouring aspiring authors and presented by the Côte Saint-Luc Public Library and the Quebec Writers’ Federation (QWF), was held recently at Côte St. Luc’s Aquatic and Community Centre.
In 2022, the Max Margles Children’s Library at the Bernard Lang Civic Centre was inaugurated, following a $500,000 donation by his wife Roslyn Margles for children’s library programming.
On hand for this year’s event were Roslyn Margles, Mayor Mitchell Brownstein and councillors Mike Cohen and Dida Berku, CSL Public Library director Janine West, CSL children’s librarian Bronwen Cathey, Lori Schubert of the QWF; and, back this year, contest judges Marie Louise Gay, a children’s book writer and illustrator from Montreal; Anne Renaud, a children’s author who writes in English and French; and Paul (P.J.) Bracegirdle, a Montreal-based writer and artist.
West told the very well attended event that her own children grew up participating in the McIntyre writing contest, inspired by former Westmount Mayor Peter McIntyre.
“It has been my dream to bring something similar to CSL and finally it has become a reality,” she added.
Brownstein said he hopes the contest will “be the beginning of a longstanding CSL tradition and…every year we gather like this to celebrate and reward their efforts.
“To our young authors, each of you has brought your stories to life with heart, humour and originality, and that’s something truly special.”
Cohen, who has the library portfolio on council, pointed out Margles’ contribution to the library, $500,000, was the “largest donation in the history of our community.
“Not only is she a donor, but she’s a doer, very involved in our library, very involved in our programming.”
Margles herself said she was happy there were so many participants in the contest.
“Regarding my donation, I had a stipulation, that the library was to establish a Young Writers Contest — that’s how important it was to me.”
The top winners in the Grades 3 and 4 category were :
• In first place, Matti Gonzalez-Idan for L’Aventure de Draven, praised as a “highly creative story full of humour, imagination and clever wordplay.”
• In second place, Sarah Israel and Adèle Mechache for Le club du journal, praised as “an imaginative and well-structured story with strong character development.”
Honourable mentions went to Madison Rappaport for Stowaway Cat; Cordelia Carrier-Sydor for Bluebell’s Challenge, the sequel to last year’s first place-winning story, Bluebell’s Problem; and Jacob Segal for L’aventure de Rob.
The Grades 5 and 6 winners were:
• In first place, Aderes Zigman for The Naked Cupcake, praised as a “joyful, creative and whimsical story that cleverly plays with perspective and self-image.”
• In second place, Anastasia Maria Ion for Les Aventures de Sophie, praised as a “story magnificently written and well structured with a rich vocabulary and an endearing heroine.”
• Honourable mentions went to Naveen Dosaj for The Gold Medal Game, second-time winner Izzy Druckman for the biography Sheldon Rubin and Nona Morakabaty for Natation avec nations. n