Eliza Victoria

notes from the philippine literary festival 2015

There were still a lot of people despite the INC rally blocking EDSA. Probably people from the South of Metro Manila? Happy to see the crowd.
The moment I sat in the Visprint area, someone approached me to have copies of my books signed. Buena mano! Salamat, Kevin.

Philippine Literary Festival 2015

Our first stop was at the “Translation: A Creative Act” panel in the Namayan Room, with John Green English to Filipino translators Luna Sicat, Julz Riddle, Bebang Siy (who was cosplaying Margo Roth Spiegelman) and Ronald Verzo, moderated by Anvil’s RayVi Sunico. Happy to sit next to Elyss Punsalan. It was an excellent talk about the difficulty of translating not just language, but class, culture, and nuances in perspective. (How do you translate “fuck” when the word “sex” is used in the same sentence? How do you translate “state” when we don’t have an equivalent in Filipino? Do you use “lalawigan”? “nayon”? Why do American authors love using “my” — my floor, my bed, my room — and how do you translate that without sounding awkward in Filipino? How do you translate the “poverty” of living in a trailer park, when some Filipinos live in houses smaller than these trailers? How do you translate a story that is not believable to you, as a Filipino author and reader?) I really enjoyed it. Sulit ang pagpunta sa Makati.

Philippine Literary Festival 2015

Book signing pa more. Thank you Anne and the others who dropped by.

Before the night ended, Mervin Malonzo and I were able to share a few pages from After Lambana. We were in a corner of Ballroom 2, sharing the time slot with Meganon Comics.
Photo from Meganon Comics’ Tepai Pascual.

Photo from Tepai.
Sharing with you some snapshots here (from pages 10, 14, and 16). Some people in the audience expressed excitement, so that’s promising!

Lambana, the realm of the Diwata, has fallen, the Magic Prohibition Act has been signed into law, and there is something wrong with Conrad’s heart. Only magic can delay his inevitable death, and so he meets with Ignacio, a friend who promises to hook him up with Diwata and magic-derived treatments, illegal though this may be.

But during the course of the night, Conrad may just discover Lambana’s secrets – and a cure to save his life.

Thank you to the National Book Store and the Visprint team for making this happen. Sa uulitin!

[survey] I’ve been hearing from readers that they can’t find my books in local book stores. Are you one of them?

If you are, I hope you’ll have the time to answer a short survey for me. The survey will ask for your name and email address at the end. This is optional, but if you leave your name and email address, you’ll have a chance to win a special prize from me. Thank you in advance!

Start here.

‘dwellers’ is best novel finalist for the national book awards, and other writing news

In this post: National Book Awards, Philippine Speculative Fiction, Voyage to Bathala, Best of the Net, Philippine Literary Festival, Filipino Readercon, goddess fan art, #BuwanNgMgaAkdangPinoy.

1. First off, my short novel Dwellers is a finalist for the 34th National Book Awards (Best Novel in English). Thank you to the NBDB (National Book Development Board) and the MCC (Manila Critics’ Circle) for the honor, and to Visprint for giving my words a home. My congratulations as well to friends and other fellow finalists. You can see the entire list here.

This is my second nomination. Last year, Project 17 was a finalist for the same category.

To know more about Dwellers (what’s it about, where to buy online and in the bookstores), click here.

2. My story, “The Target”, will be appearing in the upcoming tenth volume of Philippine Speculative Fiction. This is part of a collection of interconnected science fiction stories that I’m working on, and I’m excited to share this one piece of it with you. Thank you Dean and Nikki! Here’s the full TOC, from Rocket Kapre.

A Long Walk Home – Alexander M. Osias
A Report – Sarge Lacuesta
A Small Hope – Gabriela Lee
For Sale: Big Ass Sword – Kenneth G. Yu
Children of the Stars – Francis Gabriel Concepcion
Fisher of Men – Razel Tomacder
Hunger – Lakan Umali
IT Girl – AJ Elicaño
Lamat – Noel Tio
Marvin and the Jinni – Raymund Reyes
Mechanical Failures – Jose Elvin Bueno
Mene, Thecel, Phares – Victor Fernando R. Ocampo
Night Predators – Joseph Montecillo
Oblation – Richard Cornelio
Santos de Sampaguita – Alyssa Wong
Soulless – EK Gonzales
The Dollmaker – Joel Pablo Salud
The Last God of Cavite – Andrew Drilon
The Owl and the Hoopoe – Renz Torres
The Run to Grand Maharlika Station – Vincent Michael Simbulan
The Target – Eliza Victoria
Thunderstorm – Cyan Abad-Jugo
When the Gods Left – Kate Osias

3. Another story of mine, called “At the Diazes'”, also from this set of interconnected stories, has been accepted for publication, but I’ve yet to hear more about that, so let me get back to you.

4. Southern Pacific Review has nominated my poem “Stargazing” for Best of the Net 2015. Thank you! Click on the link to read the nominated poem.

5. Read my stories “The Missing”, “Maybe Another Song at Dusk”, “The Handmade House”, and “Voyage to Bathala” in one volume. Voyage to Bathala and Other Stories is part of the Encounters series published by et al and edited by Dean Alfar and Sarge Lacuesta.

6. I will be attending the second day of the Philippine Literary Festival 2015 to sign books and maaaybe give a sneak peek of the comic book Mervin Malonzo and I are working on. Come visit!

Admission to the PLF at the Raffles Hotel in Makati from August 28 to 30 is free of charge, but seats are limited. Thank you to Nikko over on Facebook for this image.

7. I served as panelist in last year’s Silliman University National Writers Workshop, and it was such a fun (grueling) experience. They are now accepting manuscripts. Read more here.

The Silliman University National Writers Workshop is now accepting applications for the55th National Writers Workshop to be held 9—27 May 2016 at the Silliman University Rose Lamb Sobrepeña Writers Village.

This Writers Workshop is offering twelve fellowships to promising writers in the Philippines who want to have a chance to hone their craft and refine their style. Fellows will be provided housing, a modest stipend, and a subsidy to partially defray costs of their transportation.

To be considered, applicants should submit manuscripts in English on or before 30 September 2015.

8. The Filipino Readercon team is up and about and organizing the Readers’ Choice Awards, with a slight change in rules this year. Watch out for that.

9. Alternative Alamat editor Paolo Chikiamco shared this fan art with me. “Tala’s Spectacles” and “Alunsina’s Mask”, based on characters that appeared in my stories in that volume (“Ana’s Little Pawnshop on Makiling St.” and “Remembrance”). “Ana’s Little Pawnshop” also appears in my short story collection, A Bottle of Storm Clouds (a phrase lifted from the story). Art by michstar090. Maraming salamat!

Image link: http://michstar090.deviantart.com/art/Tala-s-Spectacles-552978428

Image link: http://michstar090.deviantart.com/art/Alunsina-s-Mask-551325575

10. Subaybayan ang hashtag na #BuwanNgMgaAkdangPinoy sa Twitter o Facebook, kaakibat ng pagdiriwang ng Buwan ng Wika ngayong Agosto.

Heto ang mga itinatampok kong akda para sa photo-op na ito (iilan lamang sa mga nahila galing sa lalagyan ng mga aklat):

new books, new stories, and more

How have you been? We’ve had storms making landfall in the country, one after the other, as if we’re an important bus stop for their tour or something, and the news has been pretty strange, Chris Brown sitting next to Iglesia ni Cristo expelling members sitting next to the discovery of a possible second Earth. Sometimes my stories can’t keep up with reality.

On to the updates:

I have received my complimentary copy of the Year’s Best YA Speculative Fiction 2013. Thank you to editors Julia Rios and Alisa Krasnostein.

You can buy the book straight from the publisher.

Mervin Malonzo is making headway with our comic book collaboration, After Lambana. It was also featured on Bookwatch. See the gorgeousness.

A story of mine, “The Seventh”, is accepted for publication in the 9th issue of LIKHAAN: The Journal of Contemporary Philippine Literature. From the referee’s notes: “A disturbing narrative pursuing the uncanny as both atmosphere and lingering effect. The story is relatively short but it builds up to a palpable sense of horror…”
Tangent Online reviews Lontar #4.

“Rebecca’s life is falling to pieces one memory at a time in ‘Fade’ by Eliza Victoria. Her dreams are a fractured mix of reality and portent, while her waking life seems to be fading into an ever more nebulous fantasy of false memories and disquieting omissions. What is real and what isn’t splits further when the people in her dreams come to life during the course of one oddly deja-vu-like day. Unexpected visitors promise to bring clarity to the whole mess, but already suspecting she can’t trust her own mind and memory, how can she be expected to trust the words of two seemingly random strangers?”

Dwellers got featured on Will Read for Feels. Thanks!

“Dwellers has paranormal and suspense elements that got me right at the edge of my seat. Victoria’s work is something you shouldn’t miss—her prose is fluid and engaging, not to mention that you’ll get so immersed in the books’ universe, you’re going to want to dive in to more of her stories.”

Now: Line-edited around 40K words of a new short novel, for publication (hopefully!) before the year ends. Title and teasers to follow. Thanks again to Visprint, Nida and Kyra for the love. Also working on a collection of interconnected short stories.

kung paano ako naging leading lady: the musical

Created by: Carlo Vergara

Music & Lyrics and Musical Direction by: Vincent de Jesus

Directed by: Chris Martinez

Produced by: Dalanghita Productions

Last year, I saw Kung Paano Ako Naging Leading Lady, a one-act play about a maid working for superheroes, and loved it to bits. Brilliant comedic timing, excellent pacing. Now the one-act play has been expanded to a three-hour-long musical, currently running at Onstage Greenbelt. (It’s first run was in the PETA Theater in Quezon City.)

It is a tremendous achievement in production design, and exhibits economical use of stage space. There are a LOT of scene changes, but each one is made convincing on a bare stage, with the lights, rotating platform and vertical mesh doors used to great effect.

I loved loved loved the music and lyrics. The opening number (Paulit-ulit/Paulit-ulit na lang/Ganyan ang gulong ng buhay/ng isang damit/Di nagbabago, paulit-ulit/Tuwing nalalabhan naluluma ito’t kumukupas/Parang ako) gave me chills, and I knew I was in for something special. (Just listening to the snippet on SoundCloud is making me want to watch it again! Kudos to Vincent de Jesus.)

I also loved the performances. I was especially blown away by Mely (Frenchie Dy) and Viva (Natasha Cabrera), and adored Senyor Blangko (Nar Cabico, definitely a scene-stealing performance) and the Computer (Kakki Teodoro).

I will watch this musical again, if given the chance, but I think the story can still be tightened. I found myself shifting in my seat several times, not bored but mostly confused by what the story is trying to tell me. Where are we going with this? The musical tackles bravery and identity, important themes for sure, but there is an equally important social commentary that got lost in the shuffle.

(Spoilers! Read only if you’ve seen the musical.)

Continue reading kung paano ako naging leading lady: the musical

her story

In 1994 a British woman is interviewed seven times

about her missing husband. This is her story.

Her Story is an interactive crime fiction game created by Sam Barlow (Silent Hill, Aisle) and starring Viva Seifert. Game play is simple (and thus very attractive to an occasional — very occasional — gamer like me): you are presented with a database of seven interviews with a woman in 1994. However, the interviews have been chopped up into clips (some as short as eight seconds) and they are not in order. In order to view the clips, you can type keywords on the search bar. When you first open the game, the first keyword is already there: MURDER.

Watching the first few clips, you start to discern that someone is missing, possibly murdered, and the woman may or may not be a suspect. You only get to see the first five clips of every search (i.e. the database may say “61 clips found”, but will only show you the first five) so in order to access all of the clips, you need to get those detective skills working and try to think of as many inventive keywords as you can. I actually opened up a Word file and took notes of words I could use later in my search, mostly proper names of places and people, but also some mundane ones like “early” or “friend” or “coffee” or “sugar”.

At a certain point, the game (a person named SB in a chatbox that will suddenly appear) will ask you if you’ve got everything you needed. If you answer “yes”, the credits will roll. I answered “yes” after accessing perhaps 60 or 70 percent of the clips, which took me roughly three hours. (You can check on your progress by double-clicking on the DB Checker.)

You can continue hunting down the missing clips even after you choose to have the credits roll. I was pretty satisfied with the narrative I managed to glean from the interviews, but I’m still thinking about it. It’s an engrossing story, and a great gaming experience.

If you have played the game (or is just intrigued about the story), you can watch the clips in order here and/or check the complete list of keywords here.

Highly recommended.

h/t to M who told me about this and to J who bought me this game as a gift on Steam.

‘dwellers’ ebook now available for only 99 US cents/50 PH pesos

The ebook version of my novel Dwellers, published by Flipside Publishing, is now available on Amazon, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, iTunes, Google Play and Flipreads for a special launch price of 99 US cents or roughly PhP 50. (Please note that those with Philippine addresses will see an additional two dollars in the final Amazon price.)

The paperback (published in 2014 by Visprint) is available in all major Philippine bookstores.

Happy reading and feel free to share this post!

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