Fall/Winter Book Releases of PALH (Philippine American Literary House)

PALH (Philip­pine Amer­i­can Lit­er­ary House) proud­ly announces its 2022 Fall-Win­ter Book releases.

First on the list is Lin­da Ty-Casper’s Will You Hap­pen, Past The Silence, Through The Dark?: Remem­ber­ing Leonard Ralph Casper, a book which she calls 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.

In this book, 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.

The book has been praised by Author/Editor Joel Pablo Salud who reviewed it, say­ing: “Will You Hap­pen, Past the Silence, Through the Dark: Remem­ber­ing Leonard Ralph Casper is a trea­sure trove of charms and jew­els for those like me who find Leonard Casper a bit of a cryp­tic, enig­mat­ic fig­ure. Lin­da Ty-Casper has done a great ser­vice by shed­ding light    on Len’s mem­o­ry, allow­ing us a voyeur’s look into a life ded­i­cat­ed to the mag­ic and unease found in letters.

“I am sure this book will remain rel­e­vant for decades to come.”

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The next PALH release is Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino 3: New Sto­ries for Young Adults, which col­lects 25 short sto­ries by Fil­ipino authors 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.

Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino 3: New Sto­ries For Young Adults fol­lows two ear­li­er crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed books — Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino: Sto­ries For Young Adults (2003) and Grow­ing Up Fil­ipino Ii: More Sto­ries For Young Adults(2010), books that have been used by edu­ca­tors and enjoyed by adults and young adults alike.

The Uni­ver­si­ty of San­to Tomas Pub­lish­ing House edi­tion of this book will be released in 2022 (dis­trib­u­tors are Laza­da and Shopee in the Philippines).

Con­trib­u­tors (in no par­tic­u­lar order): Gina Apos­tol, Kan­ni­ka Pena, Jack Wigley, Veron­i­ca Montes, Nik­ki Alfar, Yvette Fer­nan­dez, Dan­ton Remo­to, Cecil­ia Bainard, George Deoso, Patri­cia Go, Migs Bra­vo Dutt, Ian Caso­cot, James Fajar­i­to, Sarge Lacues­ta. Dom Sy, Eileen Tabios, Mar­i­anne Vil­lanue­va, Mar­i­lyn Alquizo­la, Bri­an Roley, Patrick Joseph Caoile, Zak Lin­mark, Lin­da Ty-Casper, Renee Macali­no Rut­ledge, Noelle de Jesus, Oscar Peñaranda.

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And third is a children’s book, Asian and Philip­pine Folk­tales: Retellings by PAWWA, which, as the title indi­cates, con­tains retellings of beloved Asian and Philip­pine folk­tales as retold by mem­bers of PAWWA (Philip­pine Amer­i­can Women Writ­ers and Artists).

This small group of Fil­ip­ina writ­ers in Amer­i­ca had pub­lished these sto­ries in two books that have been out-of-print for many years. This col­lec­tion includes 25 sto­ries from places such as Laos, Japan, Korea, Suma­tra, Viet­nam, Chi­na, Bali, Indone­sia, India, and the Philip­pines. The book’s tar­get audi­ence is 9 and older.

PAWWA was found­ed in 1991 by a group of sev­en Fil­ip­ina writ­ers in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia. It was the first such sup­port group for Fil­ip­ina women writ­ers. PAWWA’s found­ing mem­bers are: Val­o­rie Slaugh­ter Bejara­no, Cecil­ia Manguer­ra Brainard, Mariq­ui­ta Athena Davi­son, Fe Panalin­gan Koons, Susan N. Mon­tepio, Cecile Caguin­gin Ochoa, and Nen­tuz­ka C. Villamar.

PALH is an off­shoot of the work done by PAWWA. When the group dis­solved, Susan Mon­tepio and Cecil­ia Brainard con­tin­ued the work of pub­lish­ing and dis­trib­ut­ing select Philip­pine and Fil­ipino Amer­i­can books. Lat­er, Susan Mon­tepio went on to do oth­er work and Cecil­ia Brainard con­tin­ued the work.

PALH has pub­lished books by Fil­ip­ina Amer­i­can writer Veron­i­ca Montes (Bene­dic­ta Takes Wing and Oth­er Sto­ries); Lin­da Ty-Casper col­lec­tion of a novel­la and short sto­ries (A Riv­er, One-Woman Deep: Fic­tion); and it has kept in print hard-to-find antholo­gies such as Fic­tion by Fil­ipinos in Amer­i­ca and Con­tem­po­rary Fic­tion by Fil­ipinos in Amer­i­ca.

PALH’s books can found at Ama­zon, Barnes and Noble, and from palhbooks.com. For more infor­ma­tion, con­tact palhbooks@gmail.com or palh@aol.com.

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tags: Fil­ipino books, Fil­ipino teenage books, Philip­pine books, Philip­pine lit­er­a­ture, Asian books for kids