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Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

author and editor

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Thank you too, Lauren Flores Fantauzzo (My Heart Underwater)

October 27, 2020 by admin Leave a Comment

Thank you Lau­rel Flo­res Fan­tauz­zo (author of MY HEART UNDERWATER pub Quill Tree Books) for acknowl­edg­ing me and my nov­el). I’m glad my work helped you. https://aaww.org/seven-writers-on-the-ya-fiction-that…/
“When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept by Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard (Uni­ver­si­ty of Michi­gan Press, 1999)
One day my lola made a sharp zip­ping sound with her lips and tongue, and sliced her point­er fin­ger down. I real­ized she was evok­ing bombs lac­er­at­ing the air. The sounds of Japan­ese and Amer­i­can destruc­tion in the Philip­pines were still so vivid in her mind, decades lat­er in Cal­i­for­nia. These were his­tor­i­cal mem­o­ries I had nev­er seen depict­ed in fic­tion, until Manguer­ra Brainard’s 1994 nov­el. Nine-year-old Yvonne Macaraig lives in a hap­py fam­i­ly in Cebu, until the inva­sion by Japan­ese forces dur­ing World War Two. Her father is an engi­neer who suf­fers from a bru­tal cap­ture, and Yvonne wit­ness­es the unspeak­able loss­es her neigh­bors endure. Through­out the 1941 to 1943 years of occu­pa­tion, Yvonne is buoyed by reminders of super­nat­ur­al Philip­pine beings and pow­ers. Lay­dan, a domes­tic work­er essen­tial to the fam­i­ly, cooks their meals, and shares oral his­to­ries of folk­lore and sur­vival, help­ing her to thrive.
My mom hand­ed me the book when I was a year old­er than the nar­ra­tor. When the Rain­bow God­dess Wept was a first les­son of the human­i­ty and res­cue inher­ent in sto­ries. The nar­ra­tor in my own YA nov­el is trau­ma­tized in more sub­tle ways, but as Yvonne’s rela­tion­ships car­ried her, so too is my nar­ra­tor restored by fam­i­ly and friend­ships. Brainard first taught me how to depict a young Pinay, and gave me the courage to add anoth­er to read­ers’ shelves.
Tags: Philip­pines lit­er­a­ture, Philip­pines fic­tion, Philip­pines nov­el, Philip­pine Amer­i­can lit­er­a­ture, Philip­pine Amer­i­can fiction

Filed Under: Fiction, Uncategorized Tagged With: Philippine American book, Philippine American fiction, Philippine American literature

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Welcome!

I am a daugh­ter of the Philip­pines and an adopt­ed daugh­ter of Amer­i­ca. I have also trav­eled to many places so I am also a daugh­ter of the Earth. My expe­ri­ences have found their way into my sto­ries, which try to depict char­ac­ters caught in impor­tant moments in their lives, sit­u­a­tions that force them to act, make deci­sions, change. I try to see the world from my own point of view, not the dom­i­nant West­ern one, thus my inter­est in his­to­ry, cul­ture, and set­ting. But my char­ac­ters car­ry my sto­ries; they are the most impor­tant in my sto­ry-telling. I have to dive deep into them to under­stand their human­i­ty – their good­ness as well as their bad­ness, their beau­ty as well as their ugli­ness. Just like us. Just like each of us. I need to know where they came from, where they are now, so I under­stand where they are going. Just like us.

Please read my full biog­ra­phy here

 

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