40th National Book Awards - Selected Short Stories by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard - Finalist Short Fiction in English -

 40th  National Book Awards - Finalists

I learned late last night from Ned Parfan Assistant Director of the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House that my SELECTED SHORT STORIES is a finalist in the Short Fiction in English Category of the 40th National Book Development Board of the Philippines. 

 Please read an article about the 40th National Book Awards:

 https://www.cnnphilippines.com/life/culture/literature/2023/3/27/40th-national-book-awards-finalists.html 

I am very grateful to the National Book Development Board and the Manila Critics Circle who made the announcement.

This book was released during Covid lockdowns, and it was not launched properly.  Like other pandemic-released books, this was sadly ignored.

I am therefore particularly grateful to the NBDB and Manila Critics Circle for including this book among the finalists of the 40th National Book Awards.

This book includes some of my best short stories including the popular: “Woman with Horns”, “Flip Gothic”, “Romeo”, and some recent stories: “The Syrian Doctor in Paris”, and “Melisande in Paris”, and more.

The book cover was created by noted Filipino artist, Felix Mago Miguel. In the Philippines, the book is available from Lazada and Shopee; in the US, check out Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

I am posting the book blurbs by noted writers who have supported the book (and me): Thank you Brian, Bonnie, and Danton!

Powerful, poignant and engrossing, the Selected Short Stories by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard is an important work by a major writer. Written in a poetic style rich in imagery, her observant eye’s subject is both transnational and local, societal and relational in the more personal scale of family, friendship, love. These stories have an oral quality in the best sense of the word, by a master of the form. ~ Brian Ascalon Roley, author of Ambuscade and American Son, and Professor of English, Miami University. 

 

Cecilia Manguerra Brainard’s short stories cover not just the history of the Philippines – Spanish and American colonial rule, the bloody Marcos era, the high price of fighting for political and economic freedom – but also the deeply moving hesitations and complexities of the human heart: the loves and longings and losses that shape and haunt a life, the sensuality and desires that rip apart the fabric of social life, the intricacies of girlhood and female friendship, the confrontation of cultures, the loneliness  and courage of Filipino-Americans and others who have left their homelands and the idea of home. Beautifully written, masterfully crafted, these stories are at once heart-breaking, entertaining, and profoundly humane — very difficult to put down, impossible to forget. ~ Reine Arcache Melvin, author of The Betrayed: A Novel

Cecilia Brainard's well-crafted stories deal with fictional Manila and Mexico, Intramuros and Acapulco, Ubec and Cebu. She has the uncanny ability to enter the skin of her characters and give them their singular voices. Her Selected Stories only affirm what we have long known: that she has already vaulted into the front rank of the Philippines' best writers fiction. Brava!" ~ Danton Remoto, author of Riverrun, A Novel

 My official website, ceciliabrainard.com has more information about me and my books.

Thanks again to the NBDB, Manila Critics Circle, and the University of Santa Tomas Publishing House.  

Tags:  #Filipinobooks #Filipinoawards #filipinowriters #nationalbookdevelopmentboard #manilacriticscircle