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Amy Mathers, namesake of the Amy Mathers Teen Book Award, died on May 21 at the age of 43 in Kitchener, Ont.
In 2014, Mathers undertook a “Marathon of Books,” reading 365 YA books in 365 days to raise money for the Canadian Children’s Book Centre to establish the award, created in her honour the same year.
Much of Mathers’s life was spent in hospitals. She lived with muscular dystrophy and had a liver transplant at five years old, a heart transplant at 27 and a kidney transplant at 40.
The idea behind Mathers’s reading marathon was inspired by Canadian athletes Terry Fox and Rick Hansen but focused on reading instead of running because of Mathers’s health, Stephanie Wells, executive director at the Canadian Children’s Book Centre, said.
“She read books, either written by or happening in the different provinces and territories all across Canada, and then together we tracked that journey,” Wells said. “Not only did she read a book a day — every day for a year — at the end of the day she wrote a review and they mapped it and charted it and shared it far and wide.”
Not only did she read a book a day, every day for a year, at the end of the day she wrote a review and they mapped it and charted it.– Stephanie WellsThe Amy Mathers Teen Book Award celebrates Canadian writing for teens. (The Canadian Children’s Book Centre)
“She did all of this to raise awareness and also raise money for a teen book award that she thought was really important.”
Meghan Howe, director of operations at the Canadian Children’s Book Centre, said that she’d known Mathers since she first became involved with their organization in 2012.
Howe said that Mathers’s rare form of muscular dystrophy caused her to spend a lot of time in hospitals.
“There were physical limitations caused by the condition that she was born with so she couldn’t venture out like other people but it was through the books that she was able to go on adventures.”
“Amy was a huge supporter of the centre and a real proponent of reading,” Wells said. “She spent most of her life in a sick bed or at home or in the hospital because of her illness and due to that she was a voracious reader.”
She spent most of her life in a sick bed or at home or in the hospital because of her illness and due to that she was a voracious reader.– Stephanie Wells
The Canadian Children’s Book Centre is a not-for-profit organization focused on supporting and fostering a love of reading in Canadian children and teens.
The organization focuses on fostering equity, diversity and inclusion in the children’s book world. It has given out 12 million books to first grade students, has featured over 9,000 book reviews and provides over $50,000 in awards to Canadian creators a year.
The Amy Mathers Teen Book Award annually gives a cash prize of $5,000 to an English-language book written by a Canadian for readers between the ages of 13 and 18.
To date, there have been 11 winners and 45 finalists honoured with the book award. Last year’s winner was Rosena Fung, with finalists including S.K. Ali.
Other notable winners were Cherie Dimaline in 2018 and Abdi Nazemian in 2024.
When discussing Mathers with CBC Books, Howe quoted a statement Mathers made that she felt spoke deeply about who she was. Mathers was dedicated to her passion for Canadian teen literature while working around her physical limitations.
“I realized that the two goals — the first of trying to fund a Canadian teen book award and the second of trying to show that even people with physical limitations could take part in something athletic in nature — came together quite seamlessly. I could participate in a Marathon of Books of my creation, and use the money fundraised by it to help the CCBC fund a Canadian teen fiction book award,” Mathers statement read.
The Canadian Children’s Book Centre also included the quote in their obituary for Mathers.
