Jay E. Tria's Blog, page 8

[Repost] #romanceclass: Love and Secret Identities

I see a few of the previous #romanceclass articles featured confessions. So here is mine: I’m using a pen name. That won’t come off as a shock, I am sure, since I’ve been fairly open about it. When I first decided to venture into self-publishing, the next decision to make wasn’t even if I was going to use a pen name, but what pen name to use. I told myself I was doing it to separate my identities. I wanted my author self to be in this box, while the rest of me—the corporate girl, the teacher—to be in this box. Separate and distinct. Organized. I wanted Google searches for my real given name—and I know HR people at the very least do this—to pull up results linking to my daily 9-to-5 life, and just that. It was done to prevent confusion. To maintain some semblance of order. But when I am being honest, I know I did it because I wasn’t ready to be found out as writer, and a writer of romance.   Growing up, my parents surrounded me with books and not Barbies, but much as they didn’t mind the fiction, they did push the Math and […]

Things to Do on a Spring Trip to Tokyo: Sumida Park, Nakamise Street, Tokyo Skytree,

Day 4 was our last day in Tokyo. But since we had a late flight, there was still time to go around after hotel check out. We wandered back to Nakamise Street, Sensoji Temple, then back to Sumida Park, enjoying our last full view of the sakura. There was an aptly called Sakura Plaza, an elevated area where you can sit and enjoy the view of the trees and the blooms, the river, and the people around you–grandpas in their bikes, mothers and daughters out for a Sunday morning stroll, friends picnicking under the spring sun. After an hour or so, we crossed the bridge and walked towards Tokyo Skytree. Though it was also a complete commercial space, the building was famed for its observation deck, but we didn’t have time to go all the way up. So instead we just explored the shops and had lunch at the food court (cold soba with walnut sauce dip! Crepes! Must not go home without eating crepes!). After that it was time to walk back to our hotel. We got there in time for our ever prompt taxi, and soon we were en route to the Sukibayashi bus stop in Ginza, then to Narita airport, […]

Things to Do on a Spring Trip to Tokyo: Tsukiji Market, Yoyogi Park, Takeshita-dori, Ueno

Day 3. I cannot not go back to Tsukiji Market. I know Tokyo had awesome sushi everywhere, but after last year’s market experience, I just had to have it again. So I led the way back to Tsukiji for a late second breakfast, finding Iwasa Sushi, the same restaurant where Hazel and I ate last year. I like that place because the line was forgiving unlike the more popular shops. We waited for only 20 minutes. Their sushi was heaven, even their free refillable green tea and miso soup were so good. Also the staff there are very nice. The okasan staff for one so kindly gave me a small sealed jar that was apparently a seaweed paste that you mix with steaming rice (thank you Ryn for explaining haha). After a filling meal, we took off to find more cherry blossoms. Surely these blooms offer a different, more magnificent sight in the morning, quite unique from the lighted night view we enjoyed hours before. So we hopped on the train to the nearby Yoyogi Park. We did not come prepared with our own picnic spreads, sadly. If we did, we would have been able to lie under the cherry blossom trees and watch as […]

Review and Excerpts: When Sparks Fly by Ines Bautista-Yao

Twenty-four-year-old photographer’s apprentice Regina has always felt like the plain, dull orange next to the shiny red apple that is her best friend Lana. But then she meets Ben—the first guy to ever break Lana’s heart, and the first guy to ever make Regina feel that he only has eyes for her. As Regina finds herself falling hard for Ben, she also finds herself breaking all the rules of best-friendship. Will she give up the love of her life for Lana, or will she finally realize that she deserves her share of the spotlight, too? When Sparks Fly can be read as a standalone novel, but it is also a prequel to Ines Bautista-Yao’s other book Only A Kiss. Hoes before bros. That’s the first official rule of bestfriendship as girls know it. And that’s the first thing that Regina grapples with when she finds herself falling for Ben, the guy her best friend Lana is still hung up on after he dumps her. When she stands still long enough though, Regina realizes that it’s much more than her possible violation of the golden rule of friendship that’s bothering her, and she has to figure things out at risk of […]

#romanceclass Lectures: Rock Stars and Journalists

#romanceclass is a community of Filipino romance authors (mostly indie, or hybrid) and readers. We organize our feelings two ways — Feels Day (live readings, etc. See here and here if you don’t know what that means) and romance writing lectures (guest speakers). This Saturday was a lecture on journalism romance. Yes, that’s a thing. Because, come on:   Google ‘sapiosexual.’ Because that would basically explain the kind of electricity that charged the room. Everyone who signed up to this lecture did so with no certain knowledge of who the speakers would be. Not until the Friday night before. And the announcement came with a warning flag that read ‘there is every possibility he might not make it.’ He, meaning Atom Araullo. But he came, he was there (early, might I add), together with Pia Arcangel. Both are seasoned and accomplished TV journalists in their own right, and they shared three hours of their precious time with us at Books and Borders Cafe, Morato answering questions that would help us write genuine journalist characters (or maybe any character based on how awesome these two are). Key takeaways: The cameraman is your best friend (if you’re lucky heh) Sacrifices are inevitable. […]

#FeelsRushIn recap: Things You Missed If You Weren’t There

I felt like captioning and posting pictures of #FeelsRushIn on Instagram this way, in list form as a way of organizing my feelings. I do not know if I was able to accomplish that feat; to do any sort of rationalization of emotions (huh is this even possible?). But in any case, the list is here. If you weren’t there, beware. You missed the following: #romanceclass books. A lot of the #romanceclass titles are indie, which is only a cool way of saying that these are rare Pokemon that you won’t find in your neighborhood bookstores. These are available as ebooks though and in print direct from the author (see full list in romanceclassbooks.com here). But last Saturday these books were there, spread out in one table. All our feelings side by side, waiting and raring for you to grab them and take them home. Additional perk: most of the authors were there too, so you could have met them and grilled them a bit about their books (this doesn’t happen to just me, right?

Freebie Alert! Blossom Among Flowers Turns One

It is exactly one year to the day since I released my first ever book baby into the wild. ONE YEAR! I can’t believe it’s been that long since this series of rambling posts (1 2 3 4). Heh. I can’t help feeling sentimental and nostalgic. I was very afraid to even think of self-publishing then. A few years earlier I’d tried the traditional route (at the time, the only route I knew) of sending query letters to international agents. I received polite rejection emails if I was lucky, but for the most part I was ignored. Can’t say I didn’t expect that. I was peddling a 180k-word YA manga-Jdorama novel thing that I didn’t even know how to explain. So I shared the book with the one person who knew I had written it, and asked if she would like to read it. You know, exclusively for feels. She knew why I’d written it in the first place. We shipped the same sunk ship, so she was super sweet and supportive. She got back to me with the book printed in short bond paper and ring-bound (maybe done in UP SC?) in two copies–one for her to keep, and one for me […]

Things to Do on a Spring Trip to Tokyo: Harajuku, Shibuya, Sumida River, Sensoji

Day 2 of my first ever spring in Tokyo had us running around Harujuku and Shibuya in search for sneakers, because the day before’s rainy trek destroyed my friend’s old pair. We found the Onitsuka Tiger flagship store and the Nike flagship store, both in Harajuku near Takeshita-dori. Then we got on the train to Shibuya and found Hachiko. He was corded off–I think there was an event–so I only got to wave at him. We participated in the Shibuya crossing, and spent the afternoon going up and down the streets, whiling hours away inside Muji, Tokyu Hands and Tower Records. Tower Records was something I really had to see. It’s been so long since I saw so many CDs in the Philippines. And even then, record stores didn’t go as high as 6-7 floors. Japanese CDs are expensive though. I bought the Arctic Monkeys AM album and tried to check for gold slivers inside. I found none. But it’s okay, because Alex Turner <3   Before the sun set, we headed back to the hotel for some rest for our tita bones. Then we walked a good 20 minutes to the nearest hanami venue, Sumida Park. On the way, we passed Sensoji Temple, lured towards it by the […]

Author Interview: Tara Frejas

I think this is a good time to post this interview with #romanceclass author Tara Frejas, coming off of the #NatGioWeekend high of watching Rak of Aegis that she so lovingly organized. Okay so that’s totally unrelated to the topics in this interview, since here we talked about Kpop fandom and her latest release Roadie Romance #1:  Scandalized.  But theater is one of her fandoms too, and when you read through this and get to the part where she talks about her work-in-progress, you’ll see why our theater weekend feelings made me want to share this chat with you ASAP

Things to Do on a Spring Trip to Tokyo: Toyoko Inn, Tokyo Stock Exchange, Ginza

It started when my old Economics professor said, “I’m taking my EcoDev class to Tokyo this spring. Do you want to tag along?” The answer to an invitation like that is always “yes.” But when the date started crawling closer, I was trying to squirm out of the trip, moved to do so by a long list of excuses. My professor was the type who marked words though, so my “yes” remained. The plane ticket was booked, hotel reservations were made, the visa was approved (barely made it!), and sooner than I could pack, it was time to meet and greet those famed cherry blossoms. They say spring is the best season to travel to a place like Japan. Surely my summer trip there was hardly ideal thanks to the stifling heat and humidity. Spring weather had sunny mornings that transitioned to cold afternoons and evenings. But the day could turn frigid when it rains. I still like autumn the most, though. I like that it’s dependably cold all hours of the day. You’re sure you’ll need that heavy coat and that you’re never going to sweat under your thermals. But spring wins with its aesthetic; there is nothing quite like it. Bright, colorful […]