Nazareth Memorial Library Honors Young Authors

Everyone was a winner in the  Eighth Annual Writing Contest for school-aged children.

All 24 participants were presented with certificates of appreciation as their families gathered at the library Tuesday afternoon.

“The contest fosters reading and the joy of writing books,” said Catherine Stewart, the children’s librarian.

Since Feb. 7, the library has been holding its Annual Writing Contest for young authors. Children grades K through 12 submitted original written works that were at least 12 pages in length.

Originally, winners were going to be chosen from four categories; grades K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12. Instead, all of the young authors went home knowing their hard work would be displayed in their local library.

Stewart said the staff couldn’t choose one winner, because “each book is unique in its own way.” Some children wrote about dogs, dolphins and vacations, while another wrote about a talking glove, she said.

The Friends of the Library Association has offered to pay for the stories to be bound into hardback books, which will be done by Wert Bookbinding in Grantville. Each child will receive a copy of their book, and a copy will remain in the library for loan, Stewart said.

Having participated in the past, Alexa Nunamaker loves seeing if her book has been checked out, her mother, Jill Nunamaker, said.

“That’s the best part,” Alexa said.

“Alexa has participated every year,” Stewart said. "So she has quite a shelf full upstairs.”

All of the books written by the children are kept in the children’s library on the second floor. Nunamaker, a 7th grade student at , has written eight books, the most of any child in the program. Her sister, Olivia Nunamaker, has written four.

Alexa said she continues to write because she wants “to learn how to write at a younger age.” She writes about whatever suits her fancy. Sometimes it's dogs, once it was tigers, and another time she was preoccupied with princesses. She doesn’t plan her stories; she just jumps right in and lets the story take her where it will, according to Alexa.

Olivia, on the other hand, is a bit more organized, Alexa said about her sister, who is in the 3rd grade. Olivia just nodded in agreement.

“She thinks it out,” their mother explained.

As for Olivia’s topics, all of her books are about koala bears.

“I like doing koala bears,” Olivia said. “They’re my favorite animal.”

Another group of young, sibling authors, Hailey and Harrison Durner, also enjoy writing about animals, but not talking ones like in the Nunamaker’s books. Hailey loves dolphins, so this 5th grade student wrote a non-fiction book about the varieties of dolphins. She admitted it took some time to research, but she learned a lot about the animals.

Harrison, who is in kindergarten, wrote about his dog Oscar. The children’s mother, Sue Durner, said the five-pound dog is “a little, black and white ball of fluff.”

Durner said her eldest child, Grant Durner, used to write books for the contest. One year he even wrote about Harrison. Now that he is in the 8th grade at NAMS, Grant has moved on to different things.

“He has other priorities,” Durner said about her teenager.

For more information on National Library Week at the Nazareth Memorial library, .

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