I think I’m in love.
From editor Joseph Nacino’s site:
But really, this is just an excuse to show you the final front cover art for The Farthest Shore anthology done by the excellent tyron caliente. Granted the cover is for the PDF download, the art will still be available on the actual website itself.
It’s true, I’ve never before tried writing a story for children. Well, because. But I read them, I enjoy them. I’ve heard about the Gig Book contest from an online friend (she posted a link), but I ignored it. Because I don’t and can’t write a story for children. Because. Then Gig Book announced an extension, then I had an idea, then I actually enjoyed working on this idea in my head, and I thought, Might as well write this and find out what happens. I wrote it in one night, edited it the next day, and emailed it that afternoon.
Last night, in ze email:
PRESS RELEASE: 2009 September 7
GIG CONTEST WINNERS ANNOUNCED
Gig and the Amazing Sampaguita Foundation, Inc. (GASFI) is happy to announce that ten stories won the Gig Book Storywriting Contest. [redacted] Arranged alphabetically by title, the winning stories are:
A Boat, A Banana, And A Smile by Hernani Pizarro Geronimo
A Tale of Tong-its by Sylvia L. Mayuga
Jeremy’s Magic Well by Eliza Victoria
Judith And The King Of The Sea by Andrea de la Cruz
Lost at Sea by Raechelle Castellon
Quintin And His Violin by Joaquin Carlos U. de Jesus
See, I’m Holding Daddy’s Hand by Edilberto B. Sulat Jr.
The First Day by Cherrie Anne Remoroza
The Perfect Present by Kathleen Aton-Osias
Why Uncle Martin Can’t Fix My Bike by Czarina Vijulet Jusi
I know two people on this list: Kate “Kathleen sa tunay na buhay” Aton-Osias (who won a Palanca this year), and Andrea de la Cruz. Congrats to us, ladies!
If all goes well, these books will be published by August 2010 as “full-color, fully-illustrated” children’s books. Sounds awesooooooooome.
“Hotel” is now up on the Graphic website. Click here, if you want to read. :)
If the poem’s language isn’t adequate for its subject, it isn’t poem; the subject eludes it, or we read only among its ruins. On the other hand, if the poem depends too much on language, it isn’t poem either. The poem must always transcend its language, and not be entangled in the language’s endless play of meaning. That infinite regress is the curse laid upon the mind’s hubris that denies spirit and mystery.
What is fixed in the poem is not meaning, as in interpretation, but a meaningfulness that, for one thrilling moment, is all of life for one human being – the very sensation of living, of being real to oneself, with all that lives. That one human being is the poet only, but he opens that meaningfulness to all the poem’s readers.
– Gemino Abad (High Chair Free Association: What are poets for?)
As a finalist at this year’s Philippines Free Press Literary Awards, this story has a chance to win. Not sure if it will, but being shortlisted is already an honor.
I wonder how that will go at the awarding. Will all the finalists be made to stand onstage and hold hands? Will we be given a chance to cry? Can we put our hands over our mouths and shriek when another person’s name is called? Can we hug each other but secretly think ‘You bitch, that crown should have been mine’?Tell me, is there going to be a suspenseful drumroll? GASP.
Oh, you’re still here. How kind of you.
Anyway, here’s “An Abduction by Mermaids”. Special thanks to Katt, who read it first.
Hope you enjoy it.
P.S. My poem, “Storytellers” is now up on elimae. Click on the link to read.
Okay, back to the story. :D
So today I received an email from Free Press Lit Ed Sarge Lacuesta. The Subject line reads “when you’re on a roll…congratulations from the Philippines Free Press”. I smiled because I thought he has heard about the Palanca win and was just kind enough to send me an email and congratulate me.
Well, yes, he did send me an email to congratulate me, but for a different reason. The letter begins
Dear Eliza,
Greetings! I am proud and honored to inform you that you are a finalist at this year’s Philippines Free Press Literary Awards for your story entitled “An Abduction by Mermaids.”
Holy. Crap.
My concern for the day was our godforsaken fridge, which we couldn’t close anymore due to the ice in the freezer. I called up my landlady, asked her if she could send someone over to defrost the darn thing (or attack the darn thing with an ice pick – who cares, we just wanted to close the freezer).
She said: I’ll also have your letter sent over.
I said, Letter? And she said the letter was for me.
I remembered what Paolo Chikiamco said yesterday, and I went sort of numb.
* * *
I knooooow. Poetry! Never, never in my wildest dreams. :)
Below is the logo of the Palanca Awards. They say it’s like the Pulitzers of the Philippines. That sounds nice.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go check how our fridge is doing.
Eliza Victoria 