Hello, I’m sharing the main page of PALH (Philippine American Literary House), which I run. New titles include Linda Ty-Casper’s “Memoir” of letters of her late husband, Leonard Ralph Casper. Growing Up Filipino 3: New Stories for Young Adults, published by the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House and PALH are forthcoming.
PALH also known as PALHBOOKS.com or Philippine American Literary House is a publisher of Philippine and Philippine American books and Kindle e‑books. They are available online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other booksellers. Ingram, and other US distributors carry most of our titles. For more information, email palhbooks@gmail.com or palh@aol.com.
Benedicta Takes Wing and Other Stories by Veronica Montes
PALH 2018, 190 pages
ISBN 9780971945876 (sc) $17.95; 9780971945869 (hb) $24.95
Benedicta Takes Wing and Other Stories, is the debut collection of short fiction by Filipino American writer Veronica Montes. In these fourteen stories, Montes explores the intricate workings of Filipino families as they struggle to define their place in the world. Two American-born sisters bumble their way through an unforgettable night at a Manila nightclub famed for its staff of midgets. The mother of legendary warrior Gabriela Silang has been lost to history, but here she is given voice to share her story. A lonely, middle-aged woman’s life changes when she stumbles on a surrogate son and together they create a makeshift family. “Veronica Montes limn the lives of Filipino families,” writes author Benito Vergara, “with wit, simmering fury, and an abundance of generosity. With her sharp eye for the telling detail, she depicts the grief and everyday joy handed down as inheritance, the affections and denials the bind Filipino families together.” In 2020 Veronica Montes won the Black Lawrence Price for their Black River Chapbook competition.
Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America
ISBN 9781952716095 (sc) $17.95This is a 2021 US Edition of Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America which collects 26 stories by emerging as well as established Filipino writers living in America, including Luis Cabalquinto, Linda Ty-Casper, Jay Ruben Dayrit, Alma Jill Dizon, Ligaya Victoria Fruto, N.V.M. Gonzalez, Vince Gotera, Paulino Lim, Jr., Veronica Montes, Oscar Penaranda, Edgar Poma, Greg Sarris, Eileen Tabios, John Silva, Marianne Villanueva, Fatima Lim-Wilson, and others.
This anthology, plus others Cecilia Brainard edited (including Fiction by Filipinos in America, Growing Up Filipino I and II) are valuable sources for many teachers. To quote Harold Augenbraum, “Brainard has done a fine job bringing many little-known writers – and the edginess of Filipinos in America – to the fore.”
Fiction by Filipinos in America
PALH 2020, 258 pages, (SC) $17.95
This anthology has been reprinted by PALH in 2020. The 1992 edition by New Day is out of print.
(Editor) Manguerra Brainard’s selection is a delight. Some of the stories are masterly, especially those written by such reliables as Carlos Bulosan, Linda Ty-Casper, N.V.M. Gonzalez, and Alberto S. Florentino. None is less than highly competent, and all are worth reading. Manguerra Brainard has done an excellent job of mixing critical judgement and personal taste.” (World Literature Today)
Growing Up Filipino: Stories for Young Adults
ISBN 9780971945807 (sc) $21.95
ISBN 9781953716002 (hc) $29,95
This book was included in National Geographic’s 2020 Summer Reading List:
“Emerging and established award-winning writers are the authors of this fine collection of 29 stories about what it means to be young and Filipino in the Philippines and in the United States…This impressive array captures the complexities of both the Filipino culture and history and the realities of the lives of young adults no matter what their ethnic affiliation. Each story is assigned to one of five universal themes: family, angst, friendship, love, and home” ~ Glenna Sloan, Bookbird Journal International
Growing Up Filipino II: More Stories for Young Adults
PALH 2009, 258 pages
ISBN 9780971945838 (sc) $21.95; ISBN 9780971945821 (hb) $29.95
This book was included in National Geographic’s 2020 Summer Reading List:
“This collection of 27 short stories, the followup to the critically-acclaimed Growing Up Filipino, reflects the impact of post‑9/11 wartime sensibilities among Filipino writers living in the Philippines, 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 … These is plenty here to stimulate discussion and encourage an appreciation of Filipino writing and culture. The anthology is a worthy successor to the first volume and has appeal to an audience beyond high schoool literature courses.” ~ Roxanne Spencer, School Library Journal
Growing Up Filipino 3: New Stories for Young Adults, University of Santo Tomas Publishing House 2022 & PALH (forthcoming 2023)
ISBN 9781953715170 (sc); ISBN 97819537163 (hb)
This anthology follows two earlier Growing Up Filipino books. This collects 25 short stories by Filipino authors in in the US and the Philippines about what it means to be young and Filipino. The stories explore the universal themes of coming-of-age, love, angst, family, relationships, and other young adult issues. The stories reveal Filipino and Filipino American culture, mores, history, society, politics, and other nuances. For instance, Filipino respect for their elders, extended families, religious practices, funereal rites, love for folklore are apparent in the stories.
Journey of 100 Years: Reflections on the Centennial of Philippine Independence
PAWWA 2009, Distributed by PALH, 260 pages
ISBN 0963228102
“In this ambitious book, seventeen leading scholars and writers survey some significant themes and issues in the Philippines and the United States during the 20th century. We have Cecilia Manguerra Brainard on the significance of Magellan’s voyage, and Edmundo F. Litton on colonialism and education. Epifanio San Juan on the Filipino diaspora, Valorie Slaughter Bejarano on Filipino life in L.A., Luisa Igloria on revolutionary Filipino women’s poetry, and much more. This work offers an important insight into the history of the Philippines and will become a benchmark for future studies.” ~ Roger N. Buckley, Professor of History and Director, Asian American Studies Institute, University of Connecticut.
Please, San Antonio! & Melisande in Paris: Two Novellas, Special International Edition, by Eve La Salle Caram and Cecilia Brainard
PALH, 2018, 168 pages (sc) $17.95
ISBN 9780971945883In Eve LaSalle Caram’s Please, San Antonio!, an emotionally isolated American woman’s trip to Rome becomes a powerful quest to find what she has lost: her creativiey, identity, and “an open place in her heart.”
In Cecilia Manguerra Brainard’s Melisande in Paris, a young seamstress from the French countryside comes to Paris to assist her dressmaker aunt, and discovers her talent, strength, and a precious “feeling of wholeness” in her new lover’s arms.
Together, Caram’s Beatrice and Brainard’s Melisande cross geographical borders and borders of the heart with vitality and spirit, and will inspire those who believe in the possibility of heaven on earth.
The book of novellas is also available from Barnes and Noble Online, in which there is a nice review of it that says:
“Great Summer Read that Takes you to Italy & France: I love this book of two novellas by two creative writing teachers. One story is set in Italy and the other in Paris, and so reading the book is like taking a vacation. The protagonists are women who find healing in relationships. There’s good writing in these gentle lovely stories. The book also has delightful illustrations by Nina Lim-Yuson. I enjoyed this book very much.”
A River, One Woman-Deep: Stories by Linda Ty-Casper
PALH 2017, 228 pages
ISBN 9780971945852 (sc) $18.95; 987097191945845 (hb) $29.95
Winner of the SEA Write and other Awards, Filipina writer Linda Ty-Casper, who is noted for her historical fiction set in the Philippines, presents this new story collection that includes her novella of the same title.
Her novella is set during the tumultuous Estrada years from 1998 to 2001 when the Philippine president rose to power and was impeached after massive rallies. The main character is a Filipina-American who uncovers a family secret during her visit to Manila, a secret caused by another traumatic historic event in the Philippines — World War Two. Her other stories are about Filipino and Filipino-American women.
World Literature Today’s Nota Bene section reviewed: “In this collection of stories, Filipina American Linda Ty-Casper runs her finger along the scars left behind in the wake of historical events in the Philippines parsing out what it means to live through and after the trauma of dictatorships and war.
Ty-Casper’s A River, One-Woman Deep: Stories is also published by the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House in the Philippines.
Will You Happen, Past the Silence, Through the Dark? Remembering Leonard Ralph Casper by Linda Ty-Casper — Advance copies available from Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/1953716202
& from Barnes and Noble
ISBN 9781953716200 (sc); ISBN 9781953716231 (HB)
Award-winning Filipino novelist, Linda-Ty-Casper — the author of this biography, says this book is the Memoir that her husband Leonard Ralph Casper did not get to write. Born in Fond du Lac Wisconsin in 1923, Leonard Casper had a full life as a writer, an academic, a literary critic until he passed away in 2018.
Linda Ty-Casper collects the letters to and from Leonard Casper, letters which reflect who he was to many friends, high school classmates, teachers and professors, colleagues in the Universities of Rhode Island, Ateneo University of Manila, University of the Philippines and Wisconsin, from editors of Southwest Review who encouraged Len to send stories from the European front during World War II; from Robert Penn Warren starting with his first letter of inquiry (two pages) when he began on his dissertation at the University of Wisconsin, the dissertation becoming the first book on Warren, which critics said showed the way for later books on the Southern writers. There are letters from Filipino writers Len grew to know as friends from years of teaching in the Philippines.
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PALH sells Rare Filipiniana books and ephemera — click here.
Email palhbooks@gmail.com or palh@aol.com for more information.
Tags: Filipino American books, FilAm literature, Philippine literature, Filipino literature, Filipino books, Filipino authors. Filipino American authors, Filipino American books