Growing Up Filipino II: More Stories for Young Adults

Edit­ed by Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard
PALH, 2010, soft­cov­er, 258 pages ISBN 978–0‑9719458–3‑8 — BOOK ORDER

PALH, 2010, hard­cov­er, 258 pages ISBN 978–0‑9719458–2‑1 — BOOK ORDER

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Pow­er­ful and Evoca­tive Stories

Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino II: More Sto­ries for Young Adults is the sec­ond vol­ume of the Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino series by PALH. In this col­lec­tion of 27 short sto­ries, Fil­ipino and Fil­ipino Amer­i­can writ­ers explore the uni­ver­sal chal­lenges and expe­ri­ences of Fil­ipino teens after the his­toric events of 9/11. The mod­ern demands do not hin­der Fil­ipino youth from deal­ing with the uni­ver­sal con­cerns of grow­ing up: fam­i­ly, friends, love, home, bud­ding sex­u­al­i­ty, leav­ing home. The delight­ful sto­ries are writ­ten by well-known as well as emerg­ing writ­ers. While the tar­get audi­ence of this fine anthol­o­gy is young adults, the sto­ries can be enjoyed by adult read­ers as well. The anthol­o­gy remains in print and is used by many educators.

Con­trib­u­tors are: Amalia Bueno, Leslieann Hobayan, Rashaan Alex­is Mene­ses, Pauli­no Lim, Jr. Dean Fran­cis Alfar, Mar­i­anne Vil­lanue­va, Cecil­ia Brainard, Jonathan Sia­son, Charl­son Ong, Bri­an Roley, Veron­i­ca Montes, Edgar Poma, Tony Rob­les, Oscar Penaran­da, Max Gutier­rez, Geron­i­mo Tagat­ac, Kan­ni­ka Pena, Aileen Suzara, Jaime An Lim, Mar­i­ly Orosa, Dolores De Manuel, Maria Vic­to­ria Bel­tran, M. G. Bertul­fo, Rebec­ca Maban­g­lo-May­or, and Kat­ri­na Ramos Atienza.

Praise

“This col­lec­tion of 27 short sto­ries, the fol­low-up to the crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino (PALH, 2003), reflects the impact of post‑9/11 wartime sen­si­bil­i­ties among Fil­ipino writ­ers liv­ing in the Philip­pines, the Unit­ed States, and Cana­da. Although sim­i­lar top­ics of fam­i­ly, mem­oir, and com­ing-of-age thread through both col­lec­tions, the pieces are not grouped by theme, but nev­er­the­less weave a con­stant­ly shift­ing tapes­try of Fil­ipino iden­ti­ty. The chal­lenges and con­flicts of unique ances­try and strug­gles for iden­ti­ty pro­vide a rich back­ground for mod­ern urban real­ism. The brit­tle mem­oirs reflect­ed in ‘Here in the States,’ ‘Nurse Rita,’ and ‘Ham­mer Lounge”; orig­i­nal leg­end in ‘A Sea­son of 10,000 Noses’; and breath­tak­ing tragedy in ‘How My Moth­er Flew,’ among oth­ers, are com­pelling read­ing. Some selec­tions have terse, spare lan­guage; oth­ers are almost com­mon­place in their appar­ent sim­plic­i­ty; all cap­ture moments and nuances of the mod­ern Fil­ipino expe­ri­ence that will envel­op readers.

“Brainard has again select­ed pow­er­ful, evoca­tive sto­ries of fam­i­ly: of promis­es and dis­ap­point­ment, fail­ure and resent­ment, tena­cious and all-con­sum­ing love, anx­i­ety and tran­scen­dent hope. There is plen­ty here to stim­u­late dis­cus­sion and encour­age an appre­ci­a­tion of Fil­ipino writ­ing and cul­ture. This anthol­o­gy is a wor­thy suc­ces­sor to the first vol­ume and has appeal to an audi­ence beyond high school lit­er­a­ture cours­es.”  ~ School Library Journal

“This col­lec­tion of 27 sto­ries — of grow­ing up Fil­ipino in the Philip­pines, in the Unit­ed States, in Cana­da — presents ado­les­cents grap­pling, with some con­fu­sion and anx­i­ety, about their place as affect­ed by social and cul­tur­al mobil­i­ty that sep­a­rate and also enclose them. These are sto­ries of dis­cov­er­ies about the young self at the brink of adult­hood; of long­ing for a once-com­fort­able past, of fears aris­ing from present eco­nom­ic hard­ships which threat­en the future; of lone­li­ness in fam­i­ly gath­er­ings and in school, of racism, sin­gle par­ent­hood …These are impec­ca­ble sto­ries in range of sub­ject mat­ter and modes of nar­ra­tion: part of the sto­ry of the Philip­pines and wher­ev­er Fil­ipinos live; part of the world’s sto­ry.” ~ Lin­da Ty-Casper, Novelist

“Every sto­ry in this col­lec­tion authen­ti­cal­ly cap­tures the inter­de­pen­dence of soci­ety-at-large and some indi­vid­u­al’s growth, with­in extend­ed fam­i­lies, both nat­ur­al and rit­u­al. ~ Leonard Casper, Pro­fes­sor Emer­i­tus, Amer­i­can Stud­ies, Boston College

“When read col­lec­tive­ly, these sto­ries become an embod­i­ment of the Philip­pine mosa­ic, to high­light the flu­id­i­ty of Filipino/American iden­ti­ty.” ~ Rocio G. Davis, Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor of Amer­i­can Lit­er­a­ture, Uni­ver­si­ty of Navarre

Excerpt

https://cbrainard.blogspot.com/2018/08/fiction-vigan-by-cecilia-brainard.html

 

Book Reviews

School Library Jour­nal, May 1, 2010

Fea­tured in Nation­al Geo­graph­ic’s 2020 Sum­mer Read­ing List