Woman with Horns and Other Stories

PALH (Philippine Amercan Literary House), US Edition, 2020, softcover, 101 pages ISBN 1953716040, $11.95

AVAILABLE FROM AMAZON

Avail­able in Kindle

PALH has a few rare out-of-print copies, with minor wear, $25 each, US ship­ping $10, email pahbooks@gmail.com

Folkloric, Historic, and Absolutely Charming

The 2020 US Edi­tion of the short sto­ry col­lec­tion , WOMAN WITH HORNS AND OTHER STORIES, by Philip­pine Amer­i­can writer Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard intro­duces her first book to new read­ers . First pub­lished in 1987, the book col­lects a dozen sto­ries that draw from his­tor­i­cal and con­tem­po­rary sources. Many of the sto­ries explore the clash of Philip­pine cul­ture with for­eign influ­ences that reached the arch­i­pel­ago dur­ing dif­fer­ent his­tor­i­cal periods.

The recep­tion of Cecil­ia Brainard’s first short sto­ry col­lec­tion, Woman with Horns and Oth­er Sto­ries, has been extra­or­di­nary. Her myth­i­cal place Ubec has been embraced by the peo­ple of Cebu and “Ubec” has become part of their lex­i­con. Many teach­ers use sto­ries from this col­lec­tion and YouTube has stu­dent films of the sto­ry “Woman with Horns” in par­tic­u­lar. There is even a Wikipedia write-up about “Woman with Horns.”

Praise

“Fas­ci­nat­ing sto­ries that take us back to a Philip­pine past his­tor­i­cal and con­tem­po­ra­ne­ous, against a back­drop of leg­end and super­sti­tions. In these sto­ries, the East meets the West and it’s no big deal. In a role rever­sal of sorts, the Fil­ipino woman char­ac­ters are not shy. They know what they want and get it. At least they try. It’s the Amer­i­can men who appear dis­tract­ed and uncom­fort­able with their secret need. Fun read­ing!” (Bien­venido N. San­tos, Author)

“My favorite is ‘The Blue-Green Chif­fon Dress’; and of course I like Ubec … It is quite the right place for Gem­ma, a fic­tion­al cre­ation after my heart to grow up in and remem­ber. I wish her all the best.” (N.V.M. Gon­za­lez, Author)

“The author has three counts going for her: a nat­ur­al sen­si­tiv­i­ty, an abil­i­ty to jux­ta­pose words with locale – and—the for­mal train­ing shows … Fil­ip­ini­ana lit­er­a­ture is rich­er for the Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard col­lec­tion.” (Lina Espina-Moore, Author)

“Cecil­ia Brainard is a gift­ed writer able to draw from both his­tor­i­cal and con­tem­po­rary sources – folk­tales, epics, and nuggets of her own expe­ri­ence. Espe­cial­ly impres­sive is the way she jumps into the sto­ry, and with­in three or four lines, sets the time, mood, and pace of a sto­ry. (The writer) has the abil­i­ty to depict many aspects of a fem­i­nine per­sona with­out the stereo­types: in the sto­ries, women, whether they be young or old, emerge as pas­sion­ate, inno­cent, feisty, flashy, or ret­i­cent, as the nar­ra­tive demands.” (Rus­sel Leong, Edi­tor Amera­sia Jour­nal, UCLA)

“… more than just a col­lec­tion of sto­ries. The sto­ries teach us about his­to­ry as they trans­port us into the dif­fer­ent peri­ods in Philip­pine his­to­ry … We see exam­ples of the dif­fer­ent gen­res of folk­lore as we are intro­duced to crea­tures of low­er mytholo­gies … folk beliefs … proverbs … fune­re­al prac­tices … rit­u­als.  The author has very effec­tive­ly inter­wo­ven his­to­ry, folk­lore, and fic­tion, and has come up with fas­ci­nat­ing sto­ries and delight­ful char­ac­ters that release a flood of fond mem­o­ries for the Fil­ipino read­er while at the same time pro­vid­ing valu­able insight about the Fil­ipinos and their cul­ture to oth­ers.” (Susan N. Mon­tepio for Amera­sia Journal)

“Beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten in the min­i­mal­ist style yet nev­er lack­ing col­or and clar­i­ty, Brainard’s sto­ries reach out from the deep cen­turies of folk­lore, super­sti­tion, reli­gion, cus­toms, geog­ra­phy and his­to­ry to bring them life into the present. But more than life itself, this book mir­rors the unique ways in which the Fil­ipino woman search­es for mean­ing. The locale and peri­od of each sto­ry expand rather than lim­it the char­ac­ters’ choic­es.” (Marie Castil­lo-Pru­den for Katipunan)

“A wel­come addi­tion to Fil­ip­ini­ana.” (Mani­la Times)

Excerpt

https://cbrainard.blogspot.com/2018/04/short-story-by-cecilia-brainard-waiting.html

Book Review

Review by Her­minia Menez Coben, The Halo-Halo Review, Nov. 24, 2020

World Lit­er­a­ture Today, Spring 1989

Articles and Links

Wikipedia’s page

The Phe­nom­e­non of “Woman with Horns”

Stu­dent Films