filipino works to get

Mommy, may ipagtatapat ako, sabi ni Joshua sa ina. Ano, na gusto mong maging writer? Oho. Pero hindi 'yun. I think I'm gay. O e ano naman ngayon? Gay ang Lolo Jim at Lolo Dale mo, trans ang Auntie Erich mo, queer ako, at ngayon ay gay ka, nagunaw ba ang mundo?

...Hanggang sa ang bata ay hindi na bata kundi ama, o ina. Ano ang ituuro niya ngayon sa kanyang mga anak? Lahat ng dapat niyang matutuhan ngayon pa lang, hindi pagkamasunurin at pagkakimi, kundi pagkibo pag may sasabihin at paglaban pag kailangan. Lahat ng panahon ay hindi panahon ng mga takot at pagtitmpi; lahat ng panahon ay panahon ng pagpapasiya.

Collecting short stories from: The Stories so Far (2016) Manananggal Terrorizes Manila and Other Stories (1992) Plus 3 Uncollected Stories

"In the event of an error, the only thing a writer loses is a chunk of swollen ego. But a physician’s incorrect diagnosis will always be a matter of life and death. Dr. Baticulon’s dispatches from the country’s leading public hospital are told in language that requires no further acrobatics. How do you tell a mother that the smiling ten-year-old boy in her arms will not survive the following week? How do you tell a little girl she’ll never be able to go home to play because her parents can’t afford P54,000 for her surgery? How do you live with yourself after breaking a promise to save an eight-year-old boy’s life? Like the trenches of war zones, the operating room is the frontline of life’s most difficult questions. Here are a neurosurgeon’s gripping ruminations on hope and loss." —Lourd De Veyra "Ronnie Baticulon follows in the footsteps of many other physicians for whom the task of understanding and healing humanity did not stop at the clinic or the operating room. They used words and language not only for their patients but also for themselves—a long and distinguished line from Rabelais, Chekhov, and Maugham to Michael Crichton, Richard Selzer, Oliver Sacks, and of course our own Jose Rizal and Arturo Rotor. Dr. Baticulon is a worthy addition to that tradition." —Jose Y. Dalisay Jr.

It’s a confusing time to be a woman in the Philippines. On the one hand, Filipino women have been put into positions of power. On the other hand, the expectations are still the same, raised to want and pursue the ultimate Filipina millennial monomyth: marry a man, give birth, buy a 2-bedroom house, and start a family. Any other way invites ridicule or worse, pity. What’s dating like for a millennial Filipina? Why is Romance such a maligned and antagonistic Literary genre? Why is the power dynamics between men and women during sex never in favor of women? There are no answers to these questions in this collection of personal essays, only accusations and confessions and a guileless, lingering hope that maybe it can get better for women if they keep fighting for their right to be here—and be whatever the fuck they want

Zea Asis' first book of essays is about a young woman's coming-of-age in the Philippines as bound to the necessity of movement, physical, emotional and intellectual, which become the impetus for the constant discovery of selves, past and present. Through acts of consumption and romantic interludes, across thrift spaces, office spaces, and streets, Asis captures a womanhood that refuses romanticism, and instead revels in the interweaving of grit and grace necessary for contemporary survival.

This collection of funny and heartrending autobiographical essays by the young Filipino Chinese author is a photo album of sorts—there are black-and-white shots, vivid Polaroids, ID pictures, and yellowed photographs that look like scenes from a dream.

A diwata brings a grieving slave's brother back to life as a mango tree. Two writers write their ideal lovers into existence with ink from a mangkukulam. A kapre and a farmgirl play out a tale as old as time in Spanish colonial Philippines. A girl with a magical heritage must rescue a bumbling cartographer from the hidden city of Biringan. Maria Makiling opens a pop-up cafe with human heartbreak on the menu. In Song of the Mango and Other New Myths, Vida Cruz-Borja brings stories woven from elements of classical myths and folklore from the Philippines and other parts of the world, as well as from visions of the modern and of the future. In words richly reimagined and reinvented, these "new myths" explore hidden depths from flawed characters who strive to search for a just and equal world, whether that may be in the realm of ordinary humans or the terrain of magical creatures.

"By turns brave, bewildered, unspairing, and vulnerable, these essays strive to reinvigorate kawomenan by accommodating the experiences and aspirations of a new generation of Filipinas." -from the Foreword by Mabi David