GRIEF RECOVERY FICTIONS

READING books is helping me a lot to cope with grief. After my wife died, I kept on consuming books obsessively, in an attempt to have anything that would fill in the time where I could possibly think about my loss. Keeping myself busy days after my bereavement was a pain reliever. I was loneliest when I was not reading.

I read mostly fiction, and there was a time during this period that I scoured bookstore shelves and e-books lists for any helpful grief books, hoping that they would give me wisdom to help me better understand my experience, and that they could speak to me on a personal level in the quiet solitude of my darkest days. A kind of a lifeline to carry around.

But I got no success, or perhaps I didn’t search well. I’m not the religious type of a person, and I’m not so much into reading inspirational books, though I have read a few of them.

CONFESSIONS OF A BOOK NUT

To-be read books, all second-hand 

MY love affair with books did not start until I was 13. I was a first year student of a private school in the poblacion (Sta. Maria, Ilocos Sur), and it was my first time to see a real library. I was from the barrio and I could just count with my fingers the books that I had read, and suddenly I was in a place surrounded by an impressive collection of books, a wide variety of titles, stacked up neatly in series of shelves and glass cabinets.

I knew right then what I really wanted to do, and that was to read. Soon, I was in the library devouring fantastic stories, children’s fiction, anthologies, encyclopedias, adventures and history, to the point that I had been forgetting to review for exams and submit my school projects.

I become a compulsive reader. I would spend most of my vacant time in the library. There were just too many books to read. That started my most dearly cherished ambition to live in a big house with my own private library. I even had this secret wish to stay in prison surrounded by lots of books to read, just like the young lawyer in Anton Chekhov’s “The Bet,” who spent, because of a crazy bet, 15 years of solitary confinement reading books, from novels with a complicated love plot, sensational stories, to volumes on languages, philosophy, history, and religion, thus educating himself.  

5 BEST MEMOIRS THAT I’VE READ

I ENJOY reading books and read a lot. When I have this craving for reading, I succumb to whatever book that is available, so that qualifies me as a bookworm. My choice of books is eclectic, so I read everything that piques my interest.

I have my preferences, though, as an order of priority whenever I have given so many choices at one time: historical novels, award-winning books, and books that are made into outstanding movies.

But lately, reading narrative non-fictions, or first-person accounts that read almost like a novel, is an added delight. I’m always thrilled by personal truths written not only by famous writers, thinkers, and celebrities, but also by ordinary persons who examine themselves as they navigate through life, or ones written by those who can honestly talk about themselves in a purposeful way. And I am equally amazed by those who mythicize themselves, unraveling their exploits or histories as only they know them, and by those who start as a total no-gooder, but ends up as a total expert.

I am referring to memoir, which is different from an autobiography, though both words are sometimes used interchangeably. Unlike autobiography that is laden with dates and facts of the author’s entire life, a memoir does not delve too much into life details. It only provides a record not so much bound with timelines but of a random set of events that occurred and influenced a person’s life.

According to some authors, a memoir is a self-written account of selected events and phases in life that stands out in the memories of a person. It is a true story with a real-life plot, characters, setting, a couple of sub-plots, focusing on the part of the writer’s past that has universal appeal. It should be interesting in itself, as a novel might be.

The best memoirs, for me, should contain witty, interesting short stories and feelings or events that I can relate to in my own life. It should follow a story line or compile several anecdotes, such documents of honest thoughts, with a related theme, touching a subject that is either transformational or inspirational. It should have some kind of emotional impact that an ordinary reader like me should care. And finally, the writing has to be good.

There are five captivating and awesome memoirs I have read over the past few years. I picked up these memoirs because I believe they have permanently changed somehow the way I think about certain things, and gave me the idea that all lives worth living are interesting to read.

My list here was arranged in the order when I read them.

1.      Out of Africa by Isak Denisen

      When I first got hold of the book, I thought it was a novel, which is the basis of the Oscar Award winning movie of the same title   starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. But  the book is actually   a memoir written by a Danish baroness (real name: Karen von Blixen) who took over the management of a coffee plantation on her own in Kenya after she and her unfaithful husband divorced. It’s a vivid snapshot of her life in Africa, or rather a lyrical expression  of her love to the wonderful people and nature that touched her life there. But more than that, I was touched by her relationship (though she did not clearly define in the book the nature of such romance) with Denys Finch Hatton, the British farmer and hunter whom she met in the country. The pair had a tender affair, but not that of a “permanent partnership” that Blixen would have loved to happen. Hatton would use Blixen’s farm as his home base. And they would fly over her farm and some parts of Africa using Hatton’s biplane. The relationship ended when Hatton died in a plane crash. I feel for Blixen in her anguish and infinite longing, for the loss of a person she adored so much like a soul mate, and the loss of the coffee farm due to low yields. The book is a slow read; for it’s also an account on the charm, the majesty, the beauty of the vast continent, and the culture of the tribes therein; but it’s definitely a worthwhile read. 

2.      One L by Scott Turow

This is a journal-like narrative by Scott Turow, telling his experience as a first-year student at Harvard Law School where freshmen are dubbed One Ls. I first heard about this book when it was recommended by one of our speakers during our orientation as first year law students in a premier university. But I was only able to read it when I  was already in third year, or after I got kicked out and transferred to another school. Still, it was not a totally waste of time. I came to understand where I failed or what I lacked in my freshman year. I realized that first year in law school is the most critical in the life of a lawyer. Early on, you have to survive the terrors, depressions, hazing, compulsive work (e.g. reading up to 20 cases for a two-hour long recitation in class!), and very intimidating professors. One memorable account in the book is one that deals with the Socratic method of lecturing, where there were no clear answers. It was a familiar experience in my first school to be grilled with questions by the professor using that method. I suffered anxiety over a single exam that may determine my future in law school. The book narrates not only about law school but about being human in an intense, often grueling, situation. It is a must-read for first-year law students and law school applicants, or by anyone who has ever contemplated going to law school. 
                                                          

3.      I Know the Caged Bird Sing by Maya Angelou

       I didn’t hear about Maya Angelou until she recited her poem “On the Pulse of Morning” at the inauguration of US President Bill Clinton in 1993. So when I read her memoir more than 15 years later, I was amazed at the kind of life    she had endured and how she overcame her inferiority complex, trauma and racism, to become what she is now, a self-possessed, dignified young woman, and a multi-awarded poet and author, and playwright. I have read    fictions and stories about the origin of slavery of Negroes in America, the courage of black men and women, proud and strong under oppressive circumstances, and issues of rape, molestation, lynching and racism in their quest for independence and personal dignity. I read them from Alex Haley’s Roots, Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon and Beloved, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, and Richard Wright’s Native Son to name a few. And Angelou’s memoir covers topics common to these stories, particularly the era following the civil rights movements. I was no longer shocked and saddened by them. But it was a new experience reading this autobiographical story, written in the perspective of a young girl, as a three-year old then up to her early teens in a small, rural community during the 1930s. I admire her strength, her candor, poignancy and grace, all told in her powerful language, vivid scenery and emotions. It is a good book but not recommended for young readers.  

    

4.      Red Azalea by Anchee Min

My love for historical fiction leads me to Katherine, a novel about a Chinese girl and a seductive American teacher,  and aroused my curiosity of what was life in Mao’s China during the Cultural Revolution, and to Anchee Min, the author of  the book. And this has inspired me to pick up Red Azalea, her honest and frightening account under the shadow of Mao. It is her own story of inner strength and courage as she grew up in the rigid context of Communism, and living up with ideology and gender issues, sex, suicide, humiliation and political subterfuge. The drama unfolds like the convoluted plot of a telenovela. As a child, she was taught to be a good communist and was sent to a labor camp to work in the rice fields. Consistent with Communist dogma against any type of individualism or expression of emotions, communal laborers like her were forbidden to speak, dress, read, write, or love as she pleased. She entered, however, into a secret love affair with her female supervisor at the labor camp. Later on, she was selected to be trained as an actress for the film version of one of Madame Mao’s political operas. But Mao died before the film was completed, and Madame Mao was sentenced to death. It was then that Min realized that she was just a victim to the craziness of the culture like anyone else in her country, and that life might be better elsewhere. With the help of a friend, she left China for America. It is an interesting book.

5.      Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt

      I have so little knowledge about the book or its author when   I picked it up in a bookstore. Without the gilded seal bearing “Winner of the Pulitzer Prize” on its cover, I wouldn’t have taken a second look, and wouldn’t have the chance to experience glorifying this gem of a book. This is an honest narration of a young Irish-American boy, crushed under the oppressive conditions of impoverished childhood, heartbreaking struggles with his father’s alcoholism, and his mother’s attempts to keep the family intact, the death of three of his siblings, and the casual cruelty of relatives and neighbors, but narrated by him with eloquence and remarkable forgiveness, and in astounding humor and compassion. That’s a big wow for me. The story happened in the Depression-era in New York and the war years in Ireland, where the family moved after they left America. The story, seen through the eyes of the author’s younger self, makes you laugh and cry with his heartbreaks and near-starvation, and keeps you rooting for his family’s survival. It highlights abject poverty and unemployment, those devastating conditions faced by millions around the world, but as a whole, it tells a story of hope and triumph rather than one of misery. Deserving of my five stars.

Just to round up my top ten, I must also confess an appreciation for the following autobiographical books: From Barrio to Senado by Juan M. Flavier, Nothing Is Impossible by Christopher Reeve, The Measure of a Man by Sidney Poitier, America is in My Heart by Carlos Bulosan, and Born on the Fourth of July by Ron Kovic.

I would love to write one of my own someday. I will definitely make one if only to help me make sense of my life, confront the truth, and provide myself new perspectives in life. But for now I just enjoy finding pieces of myself in other people’s lives revealed through their well-written memoirs.    

PO-ON: SELF-SACRIFICE AND NATIONAL UNITY

BEING an Ilocano myself, and having known much of our own history and language, I take pride of having read F. Sionil Jose’s Po-on (Dusk), the first in the five-book series The Rosales Saga. It’s the same feeling I had, as a Filipino and proud member of the Malay race, after reading the English versions of Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, two classic novels of Jose Rizal.

The setting of Rizal’s Noli and Fili is a fictional town called San Diego (possibly in Laguna), but the issues transcend the locale of the novel. It depicts the general struggle of the Filipino against abuses by the friars and the ambivalence of the ruling class. It is set at the time when the Philippines was still a province of Mother Spain.

Sionil Jose’s Po-on, on the other hand, is set in Cabugao in Ilocos Sur, my home province, and ultimately in Rosales, Pangasinan, the author’s birthplace. It initially describes the plight of the Ilocanos at the hands of the abusive Spanish rulers during the later part of their rule in the region, and the start of the American conquest, following the Spanish-American war. But toward the end of the novel, it conveys a message that deals with nationalism or the question of our identity as Filipinos.

The novels of Rizal and Sionil Jose both deal on poverty, poor governance and human rights abuses during the Spanish time, with emphasis on the lecherous, potbellied friars who rule the land and oppress the people. But while Noli and Fili are seen through the eyes of an ilustrado (Crisostomo Ibarra a.k.a. Simoun the Jeweler), Po-on is seen through the eyes of a poor indio named Istak (Eustaquio Salvador/Samson), who went with his family in exodus from Ilocos to Pangasinan to escape from the wrath of the Spaniards after the grisly killing of a parish priest. The journey of the family filled with tragedies is comparable with that of Tom Joad’s family in John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, who also got to their Promised Land but in the end, something had to be sacrificed in the name of duty.

Having moved by the powerful and intense narration of the Po-on, I felt a pang of conscience and regret for having read only a few emotionally charged fictions written by our own nationalist authors that really speak about us—our past, our present, and our future. Before Po-on and Rizal’s twin novels, I have read Gagamba also by F. Sionil Jose, Ilustrado by Miguel Syjuco, and an anthology of short stories by Mindoro native NVM Gonzales. But none that I have read so far, other than Po-on, speaks the history of the resilient and frugal Ilocanos.  

We Ilocanos are well scattered to other parts of the country and to foreign lands, where we account for majority of immigrant Filipinos. They say it’s about our land. Ilocos Region, or Ilocandia, is one of the smallest regions in the country. Add to this fact that the region is sandwiched by the sea in the west and by the rugged mountains in the east, a condition that has made for a very limited amount of arable land for a very industrious people. It was a tough geographical location for us Ilocanos to live in. No wonder, we are stereotyped with regional traits vital for survival, such as tenacious industry, perseverance, resilience, frugality, and pioneering spirit. Because of so very little space in the region, Ilocanos seemingly are duty-bound to move to other places in search for better opportunities not only for their own sake but for the whole clan.

In Po-on, Sionil Jose shows us the other reason for this diaspora, which is the persecution of the Ilocano indios under the Spanish regime. But prior to Istak’s story, the Spaniards weren’t particularly lucky with their conquest of Ilocos. The Ilocanos were one of the first ethnic groups to revolt against Spanish officials. Two of the Philippines’ most notable uprisings were the Basi Revolt in 1807 and the one lead by the lion-hearted Diego Silang of Aringay (now part of La Union) in 1762-63, which was continued by his wife Gabriela Silang. The Silangs’ revolt, which is also well mentioned in Po-on, was fueled by the grievances against Spanish taxation and abuses. The uprisings were short-lived and never duplicated until the twilight of the Castilian rule during Istak’s time.

These abuses by the Spanish rulers subsist in the province up to the last decade of the 19th century. Although one exceptional friar is very kind to young Istak and takes care of him like his own son, that is, teaching him how to pray, write and speak Spanish and Latin, Istak and the rest of the indios are not generally allowed to become priests. So Istak, in spite of his advance education, has to go back to his family and help in his family's farm. Ba-ac begs the new priest to send his son to the seminary, and while they are arguing, Ba-ac realizes that the priest is the one who ordered him to be arrested and hung up by the arm because of an accusation that he was malingering from the duty to offer compulsory road building work for the Spanish. In a fit of fury he kills the priest with a crucifix. Ba-ac’s family has to leave hurriedly, taking the back roads to avoid the Spanish guards. They go with other relatives who have also been expelled from their lands. So the families escape like fugitives and along the way, they encounter the much feared tulisanes and the atrocious Spanish officers. Amidst their adventures are poignant episodes of love and devotion, particularly between Istak and Dalin, his devoted wife and savior, and family solidarity and values.

At the end of the story, we see Americans now taking over but, soon the Filipinos found out that they are as bad as the Spanish. American soldiers would torture and rape the poor natives. Don Jacinto, the local landowner who helps them set up a small village in Rosales town, is very much involved in the independence movement and Istak soon starts helping him, particularly when a man known as the Cripple (Apolinario Mabini) stays at the house of Don Jacinto. Finally, Istak is sent off on a dangerous mission to take a message to President Emilio Aguinaldo but ends up at the last brave stand of El Presidente's loyal soldiers at Tirad Pass, where Istak was shot dead by the Americans.

Istak, a martyr in a very real sense, is aglow with patriotic fervor until his death. He understands that love for country, which involves sacrifice, is essential to discovering the meaning of his own existence. And true enough, he gave honor to the country by proving to the white invaders that Filipinos are capable of offering their dear lives, not only for their clan, but for our country's freedom. Sadly, this is all in the past tense. We now live in a curious era where most Filipinos wanted to be Americans or Europeans, and most of our politicians are bereft of patriotism in their service to the nation.

The Cripple in the novel says it with fire and ice: "There is so much that the past can teach us… Diego Silang—more than a hundred years ago, what did he prove? That with a brilliant and selfless leader, we can be united the way he united the north. And united, we can then make Filipinas strong, formidable…”

Of course, today there are no more colonizers to contend with, but we still have many wars to fight. There is the war on poverty, rampant corruption in government transactions, poor governance, and the never-ending struggle for national unity. Po-on clearly tells us that our dream to have selfless leaders, who know the value of self-sacrifice, and citizenry that is truly united for the country remains a dream.

I must say, Po-on is a must-read for every Filipino if we only want to educate our countrymen about our glorious past.   

GRIEF IS NOT A FAILURE

(Published in The Philippine Star, Sunday, November 27, 2011. Weekly Winner of the My Favorite Book contest sponsored by National Bookstore) 

THIS one is a brief review of the novel Ordinary People by Judith Guest. It was a fairly quick read, but I still feel its lasting impression.  And here’s why.

I didn’t know anything about the book, its author, or its theme until I picked it up and browsed it. Upon reading the backside that its movie adaptation, directed by the legendary Hollywood actor Robert Redford, was highly praised and won the Oscars for Best Picture in 1980, I didn’t hesitate to buy it.

Why not? Choosing between bestsellers and award-winning books (Pulitzer Prize, National Book Awards, Nobel Laureates’ magnum opuses, etc.), I prefer the latter category. And books made into highly acclaimed movies have always been a good alternative. After reading Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front and Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient, both winners of Best Picture in the Academy Awards in 1930 and 1996, respectively, I’ve been on a frantic hunt for novels whose movie adaptations won the Oscars’ most coveted award. 

Ordinary People is one of those novels (actually an old book from the ‘70s, when no cell phones, computers, or social networking got in the way of a good story) I didn’t realize was out there to be discovered or explored. Its theme is universal, which is the loss and the different ways people deal with it.

It is written from the perspective of a reserved teenager, Conrad Jarret, trying to tackle by himself the loss of his older brother. Out of guilt for not being able to do anything to help his brother in an accident while boating together, and feeling disconnected from his parents, he attempts to commit suicide, which lands him in the hospital for eight months. Later on, his father helps him find a psychiatrist.

The family the book depicts is appropriately “ordinary,” that is, they’re familiar to us. They could be your neighbors or relatives, or could be your own. The characters seem real: you hear them speak and you see their pain, and feel for them.
I can relate to the book’s compelling theme. I really felt for the surviving son and his father Cal, as he tries to reach out to him. I felt connected to both of them. I lost my wife last August, or barely a month before I read this book. With her untimely demise due to breast cancer, all my dreams of getting old, complete and satisfied, with her and our children sank into a black hole and I have yet to cope with the ordeal of being a shocked survivor. I had this uneasiness, however, in seeing my own incomprehensible emotions laid out before me page after page in this novel.

Reading through the struggles of the surviving family members, it brings to mind Hamlet’s affecting question: “To be or not to be?” You suddenly feel envious of the dead, because they are in peace while the survivors have to live long and deal with the traumatizing event, and suffer with more and more issues, like the idea of suicide, isolation, brokenness, deep longing for connection, and a cesspool of unwanted memories.

I’ve read some novels with the same subject—bereavement—and I can only remember Bag of Bones by Stephen King (a writer suffering a severe writer’s block after the death of his wife); The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold (a father who is consumed with guilt at having failed to save a daughter and a mother who drifts away and leaves her husband after the tragic death); and The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett (a rich hunchback shutting off from his mind a sickly son and a beautiful garden after an accident killed his wife), but none had put more than the usual amount of emphasis on depression from a clinical standpoint. 

Ordinary People is a very psychologically astute book that tells us matter-of-factly that depression is, in the words of the novel’s psychiatrist, Dr. Berger, “not sobbing and crying and giving vent, it is plain and simple reduction of feeling.” It’s your own choice why you feel numb or void of feelings, because it is your mind’s way of protecting itself. But it is the kind of isolation and being lonely and miserable that is unforgiving and cannot be forgiven when there are people who are more than willing to listen and patiently try to lift you up. I really like that shrink.

So for anyone who has ever struggled with similar loss or depression, this is an eye-opening book. It shows how grief may drive people away from the shelter of the family unit, and yet the same grief may also draw some closer together, like the son and his father in the story. Even “ordinary people” can overcome difficult and unthinkable circumstances all the time, and some handle these poignant and razor-sharp emotions differently, most of them with success. And some made good with the help of a counselor or a psychiatrist.

There is goodness about all things. The book tells us then that there is no insurmountable pain in bereavement. Life may be a lot of problems, yet it is full of hope. The good Dr. Berger has also remarked that after bereavement, “there is just Phase Two. Recovery. A moving forward.” That could be a guiding principle, a perfect mantra, in any depressing time or some shattered relationship.

Except for the deterioration of the marriage between Cal and his wife, the novel ends on a positive note. Conrad Jarret slowly starts to respond to Dr. Berger, and comes to terms with his feelings. The teenager becomes his own man and gets over wallowing in his intoxicating survivor’s guilt and identity crisis, thus resolving the internal conflict of the story.

People just need to learn to work with and around each other in order to live their lives and be happy. I would not have learned these things if I didn’t pick up this outstanding book. I am now well reminded of the reasons that life is still worth living in spite of some horrible things.

After all, grief is not a failure. 

42 BOOKS IN A YEAR

LAST year I’ve read 42 books, the most for any year since I have started reading pocketbooks when I was in grade school. And at the end of the year I still have 58 books in my shelf waiting to be read; almost all of which I bought from book stores and sidewalk shops that sell secondhand books. So far I’ve read four books last January, and this month I’m on my sixth book. And with this rate, I might finish reading all the books in my waiting list for this year.

Why the sudden surge of number of books read? My previous personal best was 17 books which I tallied in 2004 (I have been making a list of what I read since high school). I wasn’t really serious when I joined the Shelfari group, which dares members to read 50 books a year; I just wanted to try to measure up among the most voracious readers in the group, and to challenge myself as well. I almost made the cut last year. But with my target of 4 or 5 books a month, which I was able to achieve in the last two months, I think I am on track to finish more than 50 books for the year.

And I have been as voracious as I was in '04, in spite of my tight schedule of my workload in the office, my law studies, and freelance writing. And whenever I have a chance I squeeze on my time hunting for secondhand books. As if I got scared that I'll run out of good books to read!

I read any chance I get, and anywhere! I bring with me whatever book I am reading wherever I go, just in case I have a few minutes to wait for a ride, or my turn to pay in a grocery counter. Why not, a few minutes of waiting, is a few less minutes of boredom.

I can usually read even with distractions around. It depends on how good the book is! I read on my commute to work each day (about an hour each way). At work when I get bored, and sometimes on my lunch breaks, I would read a book. For the rest of the day especially before my class schedule I read my textbooks, assigned cases (photocopied from SCRA), and other law-related materials.

When I get home from work and definitely before bedtime, I devour more pages of the novel I am currently reading. And my favorite place to read is in bed with a comfortable pillow.

I remember one weekend during my college years, I practically did not rise from bed until lunchtime just to finish a John Grisham book. And some years earlier, while I was in high school in Narvacan, I would bring a book with me whenever I led my cow to graze in the pasture. I stayed under a tree or beside tall grasses while watching over my cow. But during those days, I only had a limited number of books to read. Most of the books were borrowed from someone else. I never owned a single book. I was only able to buy my first pocketbook ever, the classic Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, when I was l already working in my first job in Quezon City.

Now with my renewed interest (or addiction, according to my wife) in reading pocketbooks, I can now read classic and popular books that I never had a chance to read during my younger years. There are free sites for downloading e-books but I still prefer reading them on paperbacks. My extra pay from my freelance job had helped me shore up my budget for books. I believe that in my years of reading, my brain has become more robust and energized, as I began to appreciate life around me more than I used to. I’ve never been a social person, rightly now as a working student. How could I miss hanging out with friends or going to a party when I could ensconce myself anytime I want in any corner conducive to reading? A Sunday, of course, is a family day, and partly freelance-work day and partly reading day.

I consider these books out of the 42 which I read last year as the ones that gave me the mostest benefits of entertainment, wisdom and all: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Journey by James A. Michener, The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis, Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy, The Cider House Rules by John Irving, and East of Eden by John Steinbeck.

And more to come in my waiting list.

A RENEWED PASSION

SOMEONE has said that human nature is so weak in the bookstore.

There’s truth to that, with what happened to me one Wednesday morning while I was in a bookstore that exclusively sells secondhand books, at Waltermart near Muñoz Market in Quezon City.

It’s 11:30 a.m. on my watch, and I still had 30 minutes to spare before I go to work. But that half-hour dragged on until past 12. I knew I would be late, but I had not yet decided which book or books I must buy. And worse, I only have P400 in my wallet for the rest of the week.

With a very limited time and budget, I must pick with any one or two of many books that I had selected. Dammit, there’s so many for picking that morning when in some regular days, I could only see two or three good ones for me. I picked up Main Street by Sinclair Lewis (P65), John Lennon by Alan Clayton (P180), East of Eden by John Steinbeck (P180), Mitla Pass by Leon Uris (P45), Mexico by James A. Michener (P65), and Presumed Innocence by Scott Turow (P85). But I must choose only one or two if I hold on to the more expensive titles, or at least three if I chose the less expensive ones. The clock was ticking very fast.

To think that a day before that I also ransacked a stall of secondhand books at a lobby in Trinoma, another mall along EDSA within the city. For almost an hour of rummaging, I was able to bring home five good books: Got Shorty by Elmore Leonard, The Cider House Rules by John Irving, and Roger’s Version by John Updike, a Magic Tree House’s Dingoes at Dinnertime, and Happy Feet (junior novelization of an animation movie)—the last two were for my two boys who have also been fond of reading pocketbooks.

For the past few months I have been buying an average of one book a week, all second-hand books. With my limited budget (look, I am a father of three, have a part-time job, and a law degree to complete), I couldn’t afford to buy expensive new releases, all bestsellers, on display in National Bookstore. Even when I buy one if I got extra money to spare, I would still have second thoughts shelling out P300 or P400 for a new book. I might rather use that amount for four or five secondhand books from Booksale. Why not, I don’t exactly need new releases when there are myriads of good old books out there that I couldn’t even read a fraction of them in my lifetime.

I haven’t read the other books—around 20 of them—that I have bought since June. But I don’t mind looking at my unread books, and that, once I’ve finished reading one, I can immediately browse at them, thus giving me a choice from which I can select the next one.

My passion for reading has been increasing since middle of last year. It all started when I got invited by a friend to open a Shelfari account. I felt good downloading from my memory box those titles, from children’s storybook to romance and bestsellers to classic novels that I have read, and compiled them in a list, complete with pictures of familiar covers and some important details. Then I began to think of those books I haven’t read so far. It was then that I realized I have missed so many books since I faltered from reading and collecting books some years ago, thanks to termites which gobbled most of my first collection of pocketbooks, in our rented place near Muñoz market.

Now to catch up on my reading, I read while in a vehicle as I commute from our home in Marilao, Bulacan to our office in Quezon City, which is a one-and a-half-hour travel. And during office hours, I stole some time beyond coffee break to read pages of my book. And I’d formed the habit of reading more pages before going to sleep. So in those terms, I'm on track!

But one side effect though is that, my allocated time for my law course was now at a minimal because I have been spending more time reading fictions than reading my codals and textbooks on Taxation and Civil Procedure. So most of the time I cram in these subjects.

I don’t think it is a belated passion for reading. I haven’t stopped reading pocketbooks since high school but not as this rate that I am having now. I am starting to build up my library at home. It was my second attempt to put up another collection after that sad incidence with the termites.

Going back to Booksale, I settled on the more expensive ones: John Lennon and East of Eden. They were rare titles in a second-hand store as this one, and the copies were in good condition as if they had not been used at all by their first owners. That cost me P360, and one-hour salary less (due to tardiness) from what I would earn that day. Now you call that a sign of a weak human nature!

But it’s nice to think that when I get home I have new materials to read. Then that would inspire me to finish the one I am reading now, The Sandman: Book of Dreams, and have vowed to complete one more book by the end of the week.



My latest Shelfari account on books read

MY TOP 15 BOOKS

WHENEVER I chanced upon blogs that tell about books that have changed people’s lives, books that are memorable to them for some reason, or books that are outstanding, based on eccentric and subjective standards, I always go over their articles and find out if some books that I have read and savored are on their top 10 or 20 lists.

And like most of the bloggers, I love books and started reading early in life but I don’t consider myself voracious enough to finish a book in one sitting nor a certified bookworm (and I don’t necessarily collect books). I just love to read, especially fiction or pocketbook novels; I fill my idle time, even during a bumpy jeepney ride, reading them.

The first novel I read was Howard Pease’s Thunderbolt House. It was a good material for adventure-loving and mystery-seeking youngsters. That started early my penchant for mystery and detective stories, leading me to The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, and mind-boggling crime stories of Agatha Christie, Ross McDonald, and some titles from the Hardy Boys series.

My appetite for books was reinforced by my father, a former high school teacher, when he would bring home books, a mix of modern romance and classic titles, or from Silas Marner to Mills & Boons to Harold Robbins bestsellers, which he borrowed either from the school library or from a co-teacher or one of his students. Father would read them during the night or on weekends, while I would wait for my turn to get hold of these books. And it helped also that I have an older brother, an English major, who read pocketbooks and discuss them with me. This stirred me to read more for the next discussion.

I was already a college freshman when I started logging every book that I finished, and I’ve been doing it ever since. My latest count, discounting nonfiction books and anthologies, is 126 novels in all. And it’s only now that I started thinking which of the novels in my list have a permanent impact on me in some small way.

Well, let’s stir the waters with my own top 15 list of novels that may have changed my life just a little bit. My list was arranged in the order when I read them. I’ve also added some commentary for the top ten books to explain why each one made the cut.

1. The Pearl by John Steinbeck
I was in high school and I didn’t know then who Steinbeck was when I read this novella. It was a story that explores the secrets of man’s nature, the darkest depths of evil, and it centered on a great pearl, the Pearl of the World, found by the main protagonist. One memorable part for me was the escape of Kino, his wife and his baby from trackers or those who want to grab the pearl from him, and the cat-and-mouse chase that lead the family to a cave in the mountains. But the baby was killed by the trackers, thinking it was a coyote. Kino’s journey with the pearl ends in tragedy. Realizing that the pearl is cursed and has destroyed his family, Kino and Juana throw the cursed pearl into the sea. Sayang!

2. Portrait of a Marriage by Pearl S. BuckThis is the first Pearl S. Buck story that I have read. As the title goes, it was a story that makes you feel good about marriage. I was in high school when I read this book, and that early I know then what I want in life, aside from a good career.

3. Silas Marner by George Eliot
Before I read the novel, my father had already narrated to me the whole story during a brownout in our barrio. It was a tale of familial love and loyalty, reward and punishment, and humble friendships, centered on this cataleptic guy who was accused of theft, and later excommunicated, but became rich and fully vindicated at the end of the story. And the morning after that informal English Lit session with my father, I got hold of the book, and thus began my propensity to classic novels.

4. The Good Earth by Pearl S. BuckI belong to a family of farmers. So when I read this novel, it made loud and clear to me the importance of owning big tracts of land, and the social status that come with it. The story begins on a farmer’s wedding day and follows the rise and fall of his fortunes. As the wealth of a rich family in a nearby town slowly declined due to frequent spending, and uncontrolled borrowing, the farmer, through sheer hard work and the skill of his wife, actually a slave he bought from the rich man’s house, slowly earned enough to buy land from the rich family. The wheel of fortune turned in favor of the farmer who at the passing of years, was able to accumulate more lands until he bought even the remaining estate of the rich family.

5. Exodus by Leon Uris
After reading the book, I fell in love with the history of the modern State of Israel, and admired how the Jews struggled and finally abled to gain their independence. It was more than a history book that taught me things I want to know about the Jews. Two of the memorable characters are Ari Ben Canaan, the Jewish army leader who ably hatched a plot to transport Jewish refugees from a British detention camp in Cyprus to Palestine; and Dov Landau, the quiet, introverted teenage boy who lost his entire family to the Holocaust, but survived the horrors of ghetto life in Warsaw and of concentration camp in Auschwitz, by becoming a master forger for the enemies to save himself.

6. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
I love this novel’s labyrinthine or detective-fiction plot, deep philosophical discussions, and the mysterious medieval setting (an Italian monastery). For the first time, I came to know about monks, and what they do in a monastery. I have yet to see its movie adaptation starring Sean Connery and Christian Slater.

 7. The Godfather by Mario Puzo
This is a wonderful story that gives me a ringside view of the workings of the Mafia “families.” But what stumped me early on is the emphasis on family honor, loyalty, and friendship by these families as they wallow in a life of crimes. The novel notably reveals how the family of an organized crime works, e.g. when you are downtrodden, or unfairly victimized, all you need do is approach one of the “families,” proclaim your devotion and friendship, then request a “favor,” and the don will surely grant it. But here’s the catch, you must be willing to return the favor whatever that is. But what strikes me most was the character of the Godfather (Don Vito Corleone); discounting his underworld persona, I aspired once to be like him—strong, powerful, and wise and most of all a good family man.

8. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens 

Where love was, all was. This is a memorable line from the novel. It has become my guiding principle when I started committing myself to a serious relationship. It’s a good decision that I borrowed this from a classmate during college. I hadn’t read any of Charles Dickens’ books then. I wanted to read it, not only because it was highly recommended by my English professor, but also to satisfy my curiosity why it bears the same name as the world renowned magician. At first I was intimidated by its thickness, over 900 pages, but I enjoyed deeply, although it took me months to read it. Many stories were effortlessly woven from the main plot (David’s struggles in life) which beautifully connects with one another, all with interesting, colorful, funny, eccentric and outrageous characters, some having weird names like Micawbers, Traddles, Steerforth, and Uriah Heep. If you’ve never read Dickens before and you want to delve into his style, I would recommend you start with Copperfield.

9. Never Love a Stranger by Harold Robbins

The first Harold Robbin’s book that I have read was The Adventurers. It has very interesting plots and defined characters in this novel and it was like watching a movie or a TV series. But it is Robbin’s first novel Never Love a Stranger that I read later that ranked higher in my list. Maybe because I find the courageous and passionate story of the protagonist Francis “Frankie” Kane more interesting than Diogenes Alejandro Xenos (or Dax), the tragic revolutionary hero of The Adventurers. A few things stood out for me in Never Love a Stranger. One is the way Frank works his way up, from his meager beginnings as a Jewish orphan, choosing the wrong side of the law to make a name for himself. He has this innate and powerful drive to succeed, in spite of the harsh realities in his world, racism, and living in the fast lane in the New York’s gangland. The difficulty of fitting in with an antagonistic world and the corresponding price you must pay to make the grade is the sense you get after reading this book.

10. Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

I found this small book in the library of the school in Ilocos where I taught for a year. I thought it’s about Buddha’s life, because Siddhartha is the former name of Gautama Buddha. The novel, soon I found out, only mirrors the inspiring life of Buddha but isn't a retelling of his exalted life. Hesse’s Siddhartha has his own quest for meaning. He is a young and brilliant Brahmin in ancient India who has everything but dissatisfied with life. Siddhartha, just like  St. Francis of Assisi , leaves the comfort of his place to seek more. Siddhartha lives as an ascetic, but after meeting the Buddha, he rejects that kind of life, and ends up becoming a simple ferryman on a river.  Of all things he met along the way, it is the river where he derives his real enlightenment. He thinks that the river is god. But what is most memorable is this line from the book: Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal. A food for thought for a fresh graduate like me then, for that time I was on a crossroad, and I didn’t know which road to take, or where I will start to embark on a satisfying career. That “awakening” theme or the journey of self-discovery had big impression on my life after that year.

11.The Roots by Alex Haley
12. Ben-Hur by Lew Wallace
13. The Firm by John Grisham
14.The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
15. Rabbit, Run by John Updike

And lurking under my top 15 are Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte; The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway; A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean; The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown; and Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes.