Filipina authors sweep top prizes at the 2014 Scholastic Asian Book Awards

Filipinas Sophia Marie Lee and Catherine Torres respectively bagged the Grand Prize and Second Prize at the 2014 Scholastic Asian Book Awards on May 30 at the awarding ceremony in Singapore.

Lee's story, "What Things Mean," revolves around Olive, a girl too similar to her missing father. To understand herself and her meaning in the world, she embarks on a quest and finds out that it is she who puts meaning into things and not the other way around.

Lee is currently taking up her MA in Creative Writing at the University of the Philippines Diliman. She was a fellow at the 52nd Silliman National Writers Workshop, and a member of the group Kwentista ng mga Tsikiting (Storytellers for Children).

Meanwhile, Torres's story "Sula's Voyage" tells of vagabond child Sula's there-and-back-again: her flight to Mindoro to escape from a broken promise, and the trecherous journey back to save her friend and discover her origins.

Anthologies and publications in the Philippines, Singapore, and the United States—such as "Motherhood Statements" and "Tomo: Friendship Through Fiction"—have Torres' work in their table of contents. Torres also translates Korean works into English with her husband, a Korean scholar.

“The Scholastic Asian Book Award is a biennial search for new Asian children stories that is written in English,” according to the press release.

“The awards aim to recognize excellence in fiction in Asian stories for children, to showcase the diversity of literary talent within Asia, and to encourage and inspire more books and stories with Asian content,” it added.

The award includes a cash prize of 10,000 SGD (P348,894.01), in addition to the manuscript being published by Scholastic.

Aspiring writers may now submit their entries to the 2016 Scholastic Asian Book Awards. Deadline is on September 1, 2015. Visit its site for details and the entry form.

The awarding ceremony was in tandem with the launch of the 2014 Asian Festival of Children's Content. — Vida Cruz/BM, GMA News