Raissa Rivera Falgui's Blog, page 6

My New Spec Fic

One of my first awards was a Palanca for Futuristic Fiction. Although I write in the genre rarely, I can't help dabbling in it now and then, given my lifelong love for the stories of Ray Bradbury and Kurt Vonnegut and my Hunger Games fandom. My latest indie published ebook is a romance with hints of futurism:Always Online. The world's pretty much the same as our own, but online interaction has become more regulated, people can feel each other on computer screens and in the end there's a weird element of online interaction which I won't spoil for you.

I also have a story coming out in the University of the Philippines' next Likhaan Journal--a ghostly romance entitled "Light in the Water" which is similar in character to my story in Of Words and Water: 2014. Similar in setting too. Both take place on a beach. I guess I closely associate ghosts and and the seashore due to a creepy experience in Boracay years ago. Besides, for a city person like me, a quiet, rustic seaside setting puts me in touch with the elemental.

There was actually a trip to a desert island in my futuristic story "virtual Center" and of course the sea is important in "The Sorceress Queen" in Alternative Alamat: Stories Inspired by Philippine Mythology. There are also frequent beach trips in Always Online. I have no idea why the sea is so present in my spec fic. But then it's present too in some of my realistic fiction. I guess it's inescapable when you live in a country composed of 7,000 islands!

Why we MUST Buy Books (Not Just Borrow)

We just made a lot of purchases in the book fair yesterday, nearly all for my kids. Maybe this was the wrong time to insist my daughter change her library book, but she'd had it for three weeks already.

I questioned her, asking if she'd read it. She said yes, but added that she wanted to keep reading it. I asked if she'd read it all the way to the end. She said yes, but she had to read it many more times--at least twenty times!

The book is Virgilio Almario's The Paradise of Animals from Adarna, my publisher. I pointed out we could look at the book the next time we went there, maybe even buy it if she liked it so much. I explained that even if there was no deadline for returning their library books, it was not good to keep them too long as they were books for sharing, and besides, there were many more books she could read! She agreed to return it after reading it one more time.

My daughter clearly takes after her parents and my parents. She is not content to borrow a book and read it to the end. If she likes it, she must own it.

And she summed up the reason why. We feel the need to constantly revisit those books that we love. I find comfort myself from knowing I have the book and can look at it anytime I want. Even owning the electronic version doesn't give me this comfort. I need to be able to see it and touch it.

It's hard for us to let go of any book we really liked. Libraries for people like us are more a means to sample books. Chances are, if it's in print and we like it, we will buy it.

Our family is fortunate in having access to several good school libraries. But I'm this isn't going to save me as much money on buying books as I thought.

What to Look out for at the Last Day of the MIBF

First of all, me! I'll be hanging out at the Adarna booth from about 12-1, to make up for my absence yesterday. Don't worry about me or offer to buy me lunch, since my family has a late lunch together every Sunday.

I thought I'd pay a bit of tribute to the books that helped me most in writing my own works. You can probably find them in the book fair along with other offerings from their authors and publishers.

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth by Carljoe Javier (Milflores)

Gave me perspective on the male geek's point of view.

The Governor-General’s Kitchen: Philippine Culinary Vignettes and Period Recipes, 1521–1935

Used this for historical details of food and dining practices in Woman in a Frame and my Alternative Alamat story.

The Tinge Of Red: Prehistory Of Art In The Philippines by Jesus T. Peralta (Anvil)

This inspired me to make my geek heroine an archaeologist. If you followed my book's development on Wattpad you'll know she was originally an anthropologist.

Ambeth R. Ocampo's books, including Aguinaldo's Breakfast,
Looking back, and
Bonifacio's Bolo (Anvil again)


These helped me with the historical details in Woman in a Frame .


(UP Press)

It's funny, because while acknowledged as a source by all the authors of Alternative Alamat, we were divided into those who loved the book and those who found it boring! Certainly the manner in which the tales were written varies greatly but for Philippine culture geeks like me the collection as a whole is fascinating. I'm amazed at the frequency of incestuous relationships miraculously made legit--a trope rarely found in other countries' mythology (we're talking humans and not gods here).

Of course I'd love to have you buy my books, but there are many other great ones out there too!

Inspiring Intellectual Couples

"Don't know much about history, don't know much biology...but I do know that I love you." This would not be the theme song of these couples. Quite the opposite. We tend to think of love as something utterly mindless, but the best loves for me are those meetings of brilliant minds. It's not just fools that fall in love!

Here are some of my favorites. To be specific these are my favorite real-life couples, some of whose love stories that inspired my book.

1. Richard Feynman and Arline Greenbaum. Read about this in What Do You Care What Other People Think? and weep. There was also a movie, Infinity, based on this, but it didn't capture nearly as many of Richard and Arline's quirky romantic interactions.

Arline was actually a popular girl and Richard a geeky high school student headed for Princeton when they met. But they shared the same sense of humor and somehow they clicked. Arline then became ill and spent long days in the hospital reading. This was at the time of WWII and Richard had to work on a top-secret government project, so soon after they married, he left Arline in a TB sanatorium, but they kept in touch, with Arline keeping up the spark with original letters (puzzle messages that drove the government censor crazy, silly poems) and sending him offbeat presents. She also helped him in some experiments for fun, mentioned in Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!.

2. Lillian Moller and Frank Gilbreth -- better known as the parents in Cheaper by the Dozen. Lillian was a psychology graduate--a rare thing for a woman in the early 1900s when Frank pioneered motion study. They applied the time-saving principles they developed (such as the assembly line system) in raising their 12 children--except on occasions when Lillian's psychology and common sense prevailed.

3. Jai and Randy Pausch. Their story is documented in The Last Lecture. Pausch was a computer scientist and Jai had an MA in Comparative Literature. Jai went along with a lot Randy's odd ideas, like taking off in a hot-air balloon after their wedding (which nearly ended in disaster) and not having their dented cars fixed. She was also the main beneficiary of the giant stuffed animals he won at carnivals.

4. Pierre and Marie Curie. Madame Curie: A Biography tells how they met, fell in love, and married. A very brief summary of this is included in my book: Love Among the Geeks.

5. Irene Curie and Frederic Joliot. I wish I could remember the title of the book where I read their story. Irene was the serious daughter of Pierre and Marie, a single-minded scientist, and somewhat looked down on the jolly, sociable Joliot at first as being too distracted by unscientific matters. He recognized Irene's brilliance and admired her so much he followed her home from the Curies' lab to talk science.

6. Emma and Charles Darwin. Documented in Charles and Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith, the Darwins are cousins. Emma was more cultured, and responsible for critiquing and editing Charles' Origin of the Species.

7. Charlotte Bronte and Arthur Bell Nicholls. Nobody aside from her sisters even knew yet that Charlotte Bronte was an author when Nicholls, her father's shy, quiet curate, revealed his feelings for her. It took him some time to win the romantic Charlotte's heart, since she had always seen the younger man as dull and awkward, but she was eventually won by his devotion. Her friend Elizabeth Gaskell heartily approved of the match, which she details in The Life of Charlotte Bronte

8. Jenny and Agerico de Villa. Okay, they're not well-known, but I'm still fond of them. Jenny was my philosophy professor, and she fell in love with her philosophy prof. Their wedding nearly didn't push through as the People Power Revolution of '86 erupted on their chosen date.

There are more, of course, which perhaps I'll mention in the future. If you're wondering why I didn't include John Nash's romance with physics student Alicia, read A Beautiful Mind and you'll see it's not as rosy as the movie presented it, though ultimately still moving.

The Bomb that Changed my Life

The anniversary of 9-11 put me in mind of another bombing. On a smaller scale, still terrible, and one that I had a narrow escape from. And it also changed my life.

I was in training as a new teacher at Ateneo High School. So far we had been permitted to go to school in casual attire, but classes were about to start. I needed proper shoes. My feet are not easy to fit, and I remembered that the last good pair of shoes I bought I got from Makati. I decided to go there after our training session one day.

I told my best friend in the group of new hirees, a guy that I talked a lot to, had a lot in common with but was not the least attracted to. He was scrawny and bespectacled and two years younger. While the word hadn't been invented yet, I guess I friendzoned him from the first.

So I went to Makati, walked from shop to shop and bought two pairs of shoes and a few clothes. When I decided it was time to go, I went to the exit of Landmark department store and found it very crowded. I went out through a side door instead and walked around the side. As I reached Glorietta mall, I saw emergency vehicles and SWAT team members around, and realized something had happened. I hurried away.

At home, I found out that there had been a bombing at Glorietta, where I had bought one pair of my shoes just half an hour or so before transferring to Greenbelt Mall. What a near miss.

On Monday, when I returned to school, the secretary from the principal's office stopped me and told me my friend had been trying to get my phone number from them. They hadn't given it because it was against their policy. But he had wanted very badly to get in touch with me.

I was flattered at his concern, but I hoped it wasn't anything more than a friendly concern. He insisted on driving me home thereafter, and I had mixed feelings about it. I still wasn't attracted to him. It's a terrible thing to be so shallow, but what can I do, appearances mattered to me. I am all admiration now for people who can love those who are not good-looking.

In any case, the turning point came for me on the first day that he came to school dressed for work in a polo shirt and tie. He looked good. I decided I could love him. Five years later, I even married him--the best thing that ever happened to me.

To those who think my books like Woman in a Frame Woman in a Frame and Love among the Geeks, tend to be melodramatic and overly romantic, what can I say--I have lived such moments after all.

Struggling to define "Geek"

For my new book, I wanted to make sure how I perceived a geek was in keeping with how other people did. This meant having to define the word.

The word geek is in the dictionary, but the definitions vary. This is because the meaning of the word and our associations with it have evolved rapidly over the last twenty years.

I didn't grow up using the word geek, but I do remember starting to hear it around the time home computers were becoming widespread, the nineties, I suppose. The strongest association then was with computers: Anyone who could easily navigate what was then new technological territory was considered a geek (my younger brother, for instance). Because such people tended to be highly intelligent and became unsociable due to their obsession with technology, those traits became associated with the geek as well.

Over time, anyone with an obsession that was above the heads of most people became considered a geek. So I'd say now that a geek could be defined as a person with an obsessive interest in something that is not trendy and is usually intellectual. For instance, when Star Wars or Lord of the Rings was in fashion, people who talked a lot about the movies and wore the merchandise were not considered geeks. But those whose passion persisted long after the hype died down were considered geeks.

You may be seen as a geek, too, if your interests and behavior aren't in keeping with the norm for your age group and gender. A girl who is fascinated with bugs or a little boy who knows all the Beatles songs and trivia are geeks to their peer group. So is a grown man who wears Sesame Street shirts or a woman without kids who eats brightly-colored breakfast cereals.

The usage of the term has spread rather thin, really. But this is the constant: obsessive interest in something that most people don't "get." And that's usually because it takes extra intelligence to understand and appreciate that something. That's my observation, anyway. What do you think?

My Virtual Vacation Book

I have a new book out! It's entitled Love Among the Geeks.

View it here.

It's a romance, as the title implies, you might say a romantic comedy. I think it falls best in the New Adult category.

I wrote the book to give myself a change of pace after working on my thesis. I know, what a nerdy way to take a break. It was only because our moms were against us taking the children to the beach. So I had to take a virtual vacation instead.

I had a lot of fun writing this book, and if you do get a copy (digital only, on Amazon), I hope you have as much fun reading as I did. And if you see me at the Manila International Book Fair (I'm signing at the Adarna booth on Saturday, Sept. 20), do let me know if you liked it.

What Writers Can Learn from Robin Williams

Robin Williams' character Mr. Keating was my inspiration as an English teacher, a reader, and a writer. Much as we were taught to analyze literature in college, I've also avoided being too cerebral in my approach to anything I read. Just because people say it's great and have good justifications doesn't mean there's something wrong with you if you don't like a piece of lit. And other times, you just have to trust your intuition. You may not be able to explain in detail why something is good, but that doesn't mean you are wrong to be moved by it.

Of course, these sentiments were voiced by the actual man the character was based on. But the actor Robin Williams himself, and other actors, in fact, have a lot to teach writers.

The first protagonists we write about are nearly always ourselves. And most writers are successful at this. Who do we know better than our own selves, after all?

Yet all too often writers get stuck in a rut and find they cannot write about other people's views and feelings. Take Betty Smith. Much as I love her only remaining books in print, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Joy in the Morning, it's easy to see that the two female protagonists are portraits of herself at different stages of maturity. Both are from poor Brooklyn families, self-taught bookworms who started working early to help their families. Most of all, both have a highly-motivated, better-educated significant other that they look up to as a mentor.

As much as I love Judy Blume, I noticed even as a young girl that so many of her protagonists were the same: quiet, skinny, underdeveloped girls with short, unmanageable brown hair that they wanted to grow out. Perhaps she was aware of this, since there's more of a range of characters in her later works. It's no surprise, by the way, to read biographical details of Blume and find out that she was herself a skinny, underdeveloped girl with unmanageable brown hair. But though she might write more comfortably about this, she was also able to successfully enter into other types of characters' dilemmas--chubby Stephanie, over-achieving Rachel, among others.

Actors who do too much of the same kind of role tend to be considered limited, constantly type-cast. Although this pretty much happened to Robin Williams, he was able to show enough range of emotion in his quirky roles of Mr. Keating and Patch Adams, among others, to avoid being limited to comic characters.

We writers, like actors, also have to enter the skins of other people, imagine ourselves as them, and often it's even more challenging. Actors usually play people of a body type, age and gender the same as their own. Using our imaginations, we can go much further, but it also demands more of us in terms of empathy and observation. We would feel safest, of course, writing about ourselves, but that will be severely limiting. And so we need to constantly widen our range by observing, interacting, and reading more.

A Historical Film Set in Recent Times

History doesn't always mean events that happened a hundred or even fifty years ago (with apologies to my Goodreads Historical Fiction group's criteria). The progression of real events, showing their causal relationships and effects on people is history and a good historical story does not simply use real events as a backdrop but weaves the fictional elements in with the reality with one often serving as metaphor for the other. Which is why I consider the Cinemalaya indie film Mariquina historical.

As a Mariquena (Marikina resident) myself, I have some background on the city's history, culled from the handbook from the mayor's office. I am most fascinated with the early history of the city, once a hacienda, and someday I hope to write a book about the ordinary town resident who became the haciendero's wife and developed his property and business interests.

It's perhaps as a tribute to her that one of the main characters of Mariquina is a woman partner in the male protagonist's shoe business. The business really depends on her abilities in wheeling and dealing as much as it does on the famous shoemaker's skill.

Shoes have been one of Marikina's principal products since a hundred or so years ago when Marikina resident Kapitan Moy wanted to repair his imported shoes but didn't want to travel all the way to Manila to find a good shoemaker, and taught himself how to do it. This led him to learn all about shoemaking. The industry began to decline as the economy went down and imported goods grew more popular in the brand-conscious, consumerist eighties.

The shoemaker of Mariquina is Romeo Guevara, a traditional shoemaker, unaffected by the wave of cultural change, even as his partner and his daughter Imelda ride on it, the first demanding that he change and diversify to go along with the fashion, the second reluctantly accepting he will not change, and insisting on sneakers in place of the austere, classic leather shoes he crafts for her.

His wife was just as austere and classic, to the point of being quiet and dowdy, yet her husband's personal taste explains his devotion to her. It is she who leaves him, and not really because of the other woman. She notices the woman partner's interest in her husband, but oddly enough decides to abandon him to her. Her leaving coincides with the decline of the shoe industry in Marikina. She makes it on her own abroad somehow, a suggestion of how old-fashioned values are defeated by the modern, and how this indirectly caused the suffering of the traditional shoe industry.

For the daughter suffers, of course, and completely rejects her father's business. It is only with his death that she comes to appreciate his solid, if austere devotion.

Romeo's death comes ironically just when the shoe industry of Marikina was revived. Of course his partner was right, and creativity and diversity have helped make Marikina shoes attractive again. But these would be nothing, of course, without the solid foundation of good construction, which Romeo Guevara was the epitome of.

There are a few gaps in the narrative which only an understanding of the history of Marikina's shoe industry can help us understand. Imelda has a love interest abroad, with a daughter (theirs?) so what is she doing managing a garment factory the Philippines?

I feel that Imelda suggests the Filipinos' struggle for balance between acknowledging the need for international tie-ups and influences and being true to our country. Imelda begins by feeling crushed by the criticisms of international clients and, after her father's funeral and her reflections on his life, ends with breezy assurances to her staff that they are capable of achieving global standards of excellence. This is the assurance of the film seems to deliver to us, not just to shoemakers but to all Filipinos.

Thoughts on Translations of Children's Books

Just had a talk about my book Hating Kapatid at FullyBooked in the Fort. This is normally accompanied by a storytelling session.

This is my first time to hear my book told in English. I wrote it in Filipino, naturally since the idiom it centers on is Filipino. Certainly a few things are lost in translation. Mainly the ability to keep the protagonist gender neutral.

Given that the story is in first person, the protagonist could still have been kept gender-neutral in English. Except there is a certain awkwardness in using the gender-neutral term sibling versus brother or sister. It just doesn't sound right coming from a young child. "Sibling" isn't colloquial enough, as opposed to its Filipino equivalent "kapatid." And I'll admit that care in being gender-neutral isn't as easy when you're talking spontaneously as when writing.

It's not essential, of course, but it does help a bit. Having animal protagonists already helps because they aren't obviously a particular gender. As a parent, when reading a book to my daughter, I can always make an animal protagonist female (she insists on it). This is possible also with drawing of small children, like the child in The Napping House. My husband and I have a running argument about the protagonist of the Adarna book Si Ching na Takot sa Dilim (Ching who's Afraid of the Dark), because he says it's a boy and while I concede it looks like one, I maintain that Ching is more of a girl's nickname. I think the author and illustrator were deliberately ambiguous, which I think is good. It matters more to children than you think. Well, to my older child, anyway. She made Sandra Boynton's Little Pookie a girl until Good Night Little Pookie positively identified him as a boy. (Imaginary blurb-writer, seeing Pookie's pajamas with cars: The clothes look like they're for boys, so everyone's going to think he's a boy anyway, if they don't already. Finally! I don't have to keep calling him Pookie!)

My children are English-speaking given our family's die-hard teach one language first policy but my daughter, I am proud to say, aces her Filipino tests. Araling Panlipunan (Social Studies) is another matter, though. There are several reasons for this:

1. Translation to English is not enough.
In going over the first lesson with her, I had a hell of a time explaining everything. It was: Mga Katangiang Pisikal ng mga Filipino. It translates easily enough to "the physical characteristics of the Filipino." But such terms are not in her vocabulary. So I had to bring it down to her level anymore and say it was about how Filipinos look and why. Why in the world couldn't they just say that? Why do they insist on teaching six-year-olds so much terminology? I had to explain lahi (race)--I managed this with the help of Sophia the First, reminding my daughter that the different princesses coming from different kingdoms all look different.

2. She insists on understanding the subject matter, not just memorizing the facts.

She won't just swallow that we look different because our ancestors were from different races. I had to explain how--and of course genetics means nothing to her. I made it as simple as possible, using myself as an example. Lucky I am the mean average in my family! I explained that the skin colors of my dark father and fair mother mixed to make my light tan, and my nose is also in between the heights of theirs, and that this keeps happening to new generations, so everything gets mixed.

I don't know why A.P. books can't explain it that way instead of making the parents and teachers rack their brains. I can't wait until Adarna has a book: Why do I look like my parents? A book about genetics.

Herein lies the problem with translating for children. You can't just translate the words. Usually, if a book is written for a child, it will easily translate to the same level in another language. But not always. I had some trouble with the next chapter of her book on needs. "Mga Pangunahing Pangangailangan" translates directly to Primary Needs. The word primary means nothing to her, so I objected when my husband translated it for her as such.

You'll see from the above example (if you're not already a Filipino speaker) another problem, if you're writing a book to be read by a child: The length of some Filipino terms which are very short and simple terms in English. It can also work the other way: The Filipino word "kapwa" translates as fellowmen or neighbors, neither of which isshort or easy to read (for a first-grader, anyway).

I think that's why pre-schools tend to prefer to teach children to read in English first. Thanks to the Anglo-Saxons, there are many short basic English words, enough to make stories as complex as The Cat in the Hat using only words not longer than six letters.

There are a lot more issues but my son is bugging me to stop now, so maybe I'll deal with this more another time.