Noel Alumit - Talking to the Moon
May. 6th, 2010 08:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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littleknownbooksThis is one of my favorite books, the second novel from gay Filipino American writer Alumit (his first was Letters to Montgomery Clift).
Jory Lalaban is a Filipino mail carrier in California who gets shot by a white supremacist (an obvious reference to the murder of Joseph Ileto).
The novel flashes between this incident (& Jory's hospitalization) & memories of his past, beginning with his youth in the Philippines as an orphan who ended up in the seminary. Eventually Jory rejects Catholicism & turns to a local, pre-colonial pagan religion, for which he becomes a community spiritual leader when he & his wife, Belen, move to Southern California. Belen is convinced she's been cursed by her mother for marrying Jory (& taking him from the church); the biggest supporting evidence for her belief was the tragic death of their oldest son, Jun-Jun, as a child. Emerson, their second child, grows up feeling second best (& also is the recipient of beyond-the-grave telephone calls from Jun-Jun).
Into this narrative also Alumit works in multiracial community politics, tensions between Asian Americans & Asians outside the US, & a sharp critique of the US health care system (though the book, published in 2007, predates the latest debates on this issue).
I adore this novel; I feel like there's so much there, & the first time I reread it I definitely picked up things I hadn't earlier. I am pretty sure that will continue to happen each time I return to this book (& I will!).
Jory Lalaban is a Filipino mail carrier in California who gets shot by a white supremacist (an obvious reference to the murder of Joseph Ileto).
The novel flashes between this incident (& Jory's hospitalization) & memories of his past, beginning with his youth in the Philippines as an orphan who ended up in the seminary. Eventually Jory rejects Catholicism & turns to a local, pre-colonial pagan religion, for which he becomes a community spiritual leader when he & his wife, Belen, move to Southern California. Belen is convinced she's been cursed by her mother for marrying Jory (& taking him from the church); the biggest supporting evidence for her belief was the tragic death of their oldest son, Jun-Jun, as a child. Emerson, their second child, grows up feeling second best (& also is the recipient of beyond-the-grave telephone calls from Jun-Jun).
Into this narrative also Alumit works in multiracial community politics, tensions between Asian Americans & Asians outside the US, & a sharp critique of the US health care system (though the book, published in 2007, predates the latest debates on this issue).
I adore this novel; I feel like there's so much there, & the first time I reread it I definitely picked up things I hadn't earlier. I am pretty sure that will continue to happen each time I return to this book (& I will!).