Wild Song by Candy Gourlay: The Follow-Up to Bone Talk

Received this in the mail today. Published just last year, Wild Song is the follow-up by author Candy Gourlay to her award-winning book Bone Talk (2018).

It tells the coming-of-age story of Luki, a young Igorot girl who visits the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904. Luki was a supporting character in Bone Talk. The events in Wild Song pick up from where Bone Talk left off. This should be interesting.

The Origin of Tapuy and Other Cordillera Tales (Book)

The Origin of Tapuy and Other Cordillera Tales is a book featuring a collection of folk tales originating from the Cordillera region. Published in 1998 as an initiative by the Igorota Foundation, the volume contains 18 stories by various authors. The book was a collaborative effort with three editors (Rosella Camte - Bahni, Teresa R. Dagdag, and Marjorie M. Balay-as) and three illustrators (Anne Claire Delen, Brian Batong, and Edwin Dicksen).

I found myself a copy of the book through the Baguio Book Club group page on Facebook. This is an online book club where bibliophiles based in Baguio and La Trinidad talk about books and yes, sell books. 

Considering that the book was published in 1998, I was surprised when I got my hands on it because it was nearly in mint condition. Completely intact and good as new. 

The book, in a way, champions women as all of the stories have prominent female protagonists. After all, it was published by the Igorota Foundation, a non-profit organization who has made it one of their goals to recognize the roles that women play in community development and in inspiring localized progress.

Rosella Camte Bahni has this to say in her Introduction: "This book is special not only because it is the initial production if Igorota Foundation on the Cordillera culture presented in book form, but also because it highlights Cordillera folktales featuring Cordillera women as lead characters. It explores various non-stereotypic images of women and challenges us to review our taken-for-granted perspectives about them."

As to the stories themselves, I found them very interesting but lacking. Many of the stories feel like summaries. There's great material in the plots but they were not as fleshed out as I expected. The stories felt rushed.

I also feel a bit confused as to the authorship of the individual stories. There's a reference section at the end of the book that details the sources of the stories. However, it's not clear if the stories were taken verbatim from the sources or the editors concocted the stories based on the materials from the sources.

Overall, this is an interesting book for people who are looking for Cordillera folk tales and legends. The collection features stories from all corners of the Cordillera region. As I said, most of the stories are super-short. You can finish the whole thing in one sitting.

Where can you get a copy of the book? I got my copy from an online seller on Facebook. Search for Montanosa Bibliophile and ask if he/she still has copies left. If this doesn't work, you can try university libraries. UP Baguio sells a good collection of literature on the Cordillera. There's a chance they carry copies of this particular title. 

Public Shaming: Does It Accord More Harm Than Good?

This is a quick review of Jon Ronson’s book So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed. Published in 2015, the book contains the fruits of Ronson’s investigation and analysis of online public shaming. It’s an engrossing read that will make you think deeply of the morality (and immorality) of public shaming. You may think you have a clear understanding of the issue of mobbish ridicule. But hold that thought until you’ve finished reading this book. The issue of online public shaming is not as black-and-white as you might think.

Ronson is an investigative journalist of the highest calibre. One unique ingredient in his work that allows him to stand out from other serious investigative journalists is his humor. In the eyes of Ronson, no topic is immune from his brand of written comedy. In So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, his punch lines were nothing short of masterful. His writing style is crystal clear but gritty. He has the rare ability of keeping your interest level from wavering down. Before you even know it, you are halfway through the tome.

Throughout the book, Ronson provides several high-profile examples of public shaming. By high-profile, I mean that the public shaming garnered immense attention online. That is both mainstream media outlets and small independent bloggers had their say on the “shaming”. To name just a few of Ronson’s case studies: Jonah Lehrer, Justine Sacco, Lindsey Stone, and Adria Richards.

Ronson started writing the book with the utmost curiosity. He was looking for answers and he invites the reader to join him on the journey. He doesn’t tell you what you should or should not think. He encourages you to find your own answers. He offers you his case studies. Who shamed who. What happened after the shaming. The physical and mental damages to both shamer and shamee. Where are they now. In short, Ronson paints the factual picture. You are free to interpret the picture that you see.

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from this book. A single tweet can ruin your life. A bad joke can cost you your job. Participating in misdirected online mob justice can be very dangerous. A good number of people committed suicide after being shamed online by hundreds if not thousands of people. There’s a lot more that you can learn from the book depending on your background or where you’re coming from.

It’s so easy to join any bandwagon online. Someone tweeted something racist and the world piles on that person. It’s often too difficult to fight the urge to join the mob. We are easily enraged. What’s often lost in the ensuing melee is the harm being done to the person being mobbed. Time and time again, we will soon find out that the person doesn’t deserve such vitriol and hate. Ronson’s book drives that point home. Does a person deserve to lose her job or have her career prospects flushed down the gutter because of a tweet that everyone misunderstood or misconstrued?

Ronson’s greatest accomplishment with this book is his providing a light over the TRUE cost of online public shaming. Ronson is indirectly saying that we are better than this. We can be nicer than this. Why are we so passionate in destroying other people’s lives? Yet we are not even sure if they deserve it or not. At its core, online public shaming is the act of ridiculing people you don’t know. People you haven’t even met. People who could be close friends under different circumstances.

People respond to online shaming in many ways but we can categorize them into two. There are those who take the ridicule well and are able to move on with their lives. Then there are those who completely break down and resort to self-harm.

Justine Sacco, one of Ronson’s case studies, survived the shaming. In her own words: “My life is not ruined. My resilience makes me who I am. The world can try to break a person, but only that person can allow herself to be broken. I took major steps to overcome that debacle. I stayed true to myself and that got me through the darkest time in my life. I don’t want people to think I’m at the bottom of a depression pit. Because I’m truly not.”

And then there was Ariel Runis at the other end of the spectrum. When he was shamed by thousands of people on Facebook, he pointed a gun at his head and pulled the trigger. Before he took his own life, he posted this message on Facebook: “Up until two days ago, my life looked rosy. But each Facebook share is a sharpened arrow driven into my flesh. All my life’s work has at once vanished, with the thrust of a word, disappeared. For years I have worked to make a name for myself, a name now synonymous with the vilest of terms –racism. This will be my fate from now on.”

I’ll end this piece with a long quote from the book’s Afterword. I think it perfectly encapsulates the message of the book. There’s a reason why Ronson saved it for last.

“Maybe there are two types of people in the world: those who favour humans over ideology, and those who favour ideology over humans. I favour humans over ideology, but right now the ideologues are winning, and they’re creating a stage for constant artificial dramas, where everyone is either a magnificent hero or a sickening villain. We can lead good, ethical lives, but some bad phraseology in a tweet can overwhelm it all – even though we know that’s not how we should define our fellow humans. What’s true about our fellow humans is that we are clever and stupid. We are grey areas.

And so, unpleasant as it will surely be for you, when you see an unfair or an ambiguous shaming unfold, speak up on behalf of the shamed person. A babble of opposing voices – that’s democracy.

The great thing about social media was how it gave a voice to voiceless people. Let’s not turn into a world where the smartest way to survive is to go back to being voiceless.”

Other books by Jon Ronson you might want to dig into:
1. Them: Adventures with Extremists
2. The Men Who Stare at Goats
3. Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries
4. The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry
5. Out of the Ordinary: True Tales of Everyday Craziness
6. What I Do: More True Tales of Everyday Craziness
7. Frank: The true Story That Inspired the Movie

The End of Your Life Book Club: Reading Literature As A Respite From The Inescapable

Learning that you are going to die in a few months’ time has got to be the worst dark gift a human being can ever receive. At least for someone that still has the penchant for life. It would be a completely different story for someone who is more than happy to meet his or her maker. An out-of-his-luck convict for example.

But for someone wishing to see the sun rise a few more times, hearing the news that death is waiting around the corner will be soul-crushing. Once you are dealt with the card, you have no choice but to play it. The end will come sooner or later.

But the good news is - if you can call it that – you can play the card any way you want. Your hour will come, sure. But you can do anything you want before that hour comes. You have the choice on how you are going to spend those remaining days, weeks, or months.

So if you are given a few months to live, how are you going to make those last months bearable and productive? This is the question that Will Schwalbe answers in his memoir, The End of Your Life Book Club. However, in this case, Will isn’t the one dying. It’s his mother, Mary Anne.

Diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and with zero to little chances of beating the illness, Mary Anne knew exactly where she’s headed. All that’s left to do is make the most out of her remaining days. That means starting a book club with her son Will. Among other things, of course.

It’s a book club with just two members, Will and Mary Anne. They would exchange books when they meet. They would talk about books as they wait for Mary Anne’s chemotherapy sessions. They turned reading into a weapon in battling the onslaught of cancer on Mary Anne’s physical and mental well-being.

Will also takes the time to introduce the reader to Mary Anne. Mary Anne wasn’t just a mother. She wasn’t just Will’s mother. She was a mother to hundreds if not thousands of people. Mary Anne made selflessness a career. She has worked with charities and foundations that helped less privileged people in Africa and Asia. She has been to war-torn countries like Afghanistan and Sudan. A tough and courageous woman with a heart of gold. That’s who she was.

At its core, The End of Your Life Book Club is about acceptance, love, hope, and touching lives through selflessness and tolerance. Will painted these themes with books and literature as his paint brushes. Knowing that you are going to die is harsh. Knowing that your mother is going to die is heart-breaking. But amidst all that darkness, there is light. Follow that light, make the most out of it, and the final hour won’t hurt that much.

In many ways, The End of Your Life Book Club is a love letter to book lovers. As Will and Mary Anne discuss the books they’re reading or books they’ve read in the past, you’ll feel like you are discussing the books with them. That is if you’ve read the books yourself. You are almost forced to compare what you thought about the books to what they are saying about the books.

If you haven’t read the books they were discussing, you can take these as recommendations. Titles to potentially add to your reading list.

Note: The book comes with an appendix which alphabetically lists all the titles mentioned in the book. It’s an eclectic list (i.e. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Purgatorio, The Great Santini, the Bite of the Mango, etc.).

George R.R. Martin On His Development As A Writer

George R.R. Martin is without question among the most well-known writers of this generation. Even before the adaptation of his books into an uber popular television series by HBO, Martin occupied a special spot in the hearts of millions of bibliophiles. I am among those who look up to the man not just in the context of a reader but as an aspiring writer as well.

As with any aspiring writer who looks up to a writing giant, I’ve always been curious as to how Martin developed as a writer. What books did he read as a child? What made him decide to write stories under the banners of science fiction, fantasy, and horror? Why didn’t he take the routes of spy thrillers or historical fiction?

I found bits of answers to these questions in his Introduction for the anthology book Warriors 3. Published in 2010, Warriors 3 is a collection of stories by seven bestselling authors (Diana Gabaldon, Robin Hobb, Lawrence Block, Carrie Vaughn, David Morrell, James Rollins, and Joe R. Lansdale). Martin co-edited the book with Gardner Dozois.

In his Introduction which he aptly subtitled Stories from the Spinner Rack, Martin takes us back to when he was growing up in Bayonne, New Jersey. A kid who loved books, Martin agonized on how to budget his dollar-a-week allowance.

“My allowance was a dollar a week, and figuring out how I was going to split that up between ten-cent comic books (when the price went up to twelve cents, it really blew the hell out of my budget), thirty-five-cent paperbacks, a candy bar or two, the infrequent quarter malt or ice cream soda, and an occasional game of Skee-Ball at Uncle Milty’s down the block was always one of the more agonizing decisions of the week, and honed my math skills to the utmost.” – George R.R. Martin

Martin recalls the joy and mystery of going through the paperbacks in a spinner rack at a corner store. In those days, the books weren’t arranged or shelved based on genres. The books were mixed together. You might find The Brothers Karamazov sandwiched between a Barbara Cartland heart-stopper and a Robert Heinlein space saga.

Martin remembers his days going through the spinner rack:

“Looking back now, almost half a century later, I can see that that wire spinner rack had a profound impact on my later development as a writer. All writers are readers first, and all of us write the sort of books we want to read. I started out loving science fiction…but inevitably, digging through those paperbacks, I found myself intrigued by other sorts of books as well. I started reading horror when a book with Boris Karloff on the cover caught my attention. Robert E. Howard and L. Sprague de Camp hooked me on fantasy, just in time for J.R.R. Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings. The historical epics of Dumas and Thomas B. Costain featured sword fights too, so I soon started reading those as well, and that led me to other epochs of history and other authors. When I came upon Charles Dickens and Mark Twain and Rudyard Kipling on the spinner rack, I grabbed them up too, to read the original versions of some of my favorite stories, and to see how they differed from the Classics Illustrated versions. Some of the mysteries I found on the rack had cover art so salacious that I had to smuggle them into the apartment and read them when my mother wasn’t watching, but I sampled those as well, and have been reading mysteries ever since. Ian Fleming and James Bond led me into the world of thrillers and espionage novels, and Jack Schaefer’s Shane into westerns.” – George R.R. Martin

Martin now laments today’s bookstores where “genre is king”. You walk into a store and you know exactly where the fantasy or the self-help books are. The mystery and surprise that the spinner rack afforded is now gone. Martin admits it’s good for selling more books but he adds that it’s not good for readers.

“It’s good for selling books, I guess. It’s convenient. Easy to find the sort of books you like. No one has to get down on their knees in hopes of finding jack Vance’s Big Planet behind that copy of How to Win Friends and Influence People.

But it’s not good for readers, I suspect, and it’s definitely not good for writers. Books should broaden us, take us to places we have never been and show us things we’ve never seen, expand our horizons and our way of looking at the world. Limiting your reading to a single genre defeats that. It limits us, makes us smaller.” – George R.R. Martin

A Walk In The Woods: When The Appalachian Trail Beckons

[This is a review of the book A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. Published in 1997 by Doubleday and by Black Swan the next year, A Walk in the Woods chronicles Bryson's attempt to trek and complete the Appalachian Trail. Other travel books by Bryson include Notes from a Small Island and The Lost Continent.]

If you have any semblance of interest in hiking, then I’m sure you’ve heard of the great Appalachian Trail. Fans of brevity simply refer to it as the AT. Stretching for more than two thousand miles along America’s eastern seaboard, it’s the granddaddy of long treks. This gargantuan trail is the muse for Bill Bryson’s book called A Walk in the Woods. In his early forties, Bryson thought it wise to go on an adventure and hike the entirety of the Appalachian Trail. For company, he brought with him a friend, a weirdo named Stephen Katz.

With their backs bent and burdened by overloaded packs, they embarked on a bittersweet journey through the legendary nooks and corners of the Appalachian Trail. With honesty, cleverness, and humor, Bryson chronicles their exploits on the trails. Bryson has achieved something extraordinary here. You would think that a one-time attempt of completing the Appalachian Trail would only merit an article or two. Bryson said to hell with that and proceeded to write a 350-page book about his attempt. With undeniable storytelling prowess, Bryson weaves stories that inspire you and make you pine for the woods.

I’d like to assume that Bryson wrote the book with hikers and outdoor enthusiasts in mind. The fact that I’m a hiker myself made the book more enjoyable to read. In many ways, the book pays tribute to the perks and tribulations of being a hiker. Yep, I get that reference. Yes, that’s exactly what I felt after a 12-hour trek. Yeah, sometimes I feel like I’d rather push an ice pick through my head rather than go on a long hike ever again. Bryson’s prose connects with you as if you are right there sitting right beside him in a cold shelter along the trail with Katz trying to build a fire with damp twigs just a few feet away.

It’s nice to know as well that Bryson did his research. He gave the book a nice dose of historical stories and anecdotes. You get a quick history lesson about how the Appalachian Trail came about. He connects these historical snippets with his own experiences in the trails. This is a rare talent that only a few writers are able to master. With that said, A Walk in the Woods isn’t just a fun and readable adventure book, it’s also “Exhibit A” for aspiring writers wanting to learn a trick or two on nature writing.

Overall, A Walk in the Woods was an enjoyable read. If you are a hiker, there’s a good chance you will like this book. If you’re not much of an outdoors person, you may not like the topic but Bryson’s humor and good writing might carry you through.

Wikimedia Commons

On that note, I’ll leave you with this quote from the book: “I had come to realize that I didn’t have any feelings towards the Appalachian Trail that weren’t thoroughly contradictory. I was weary of the trail, but captivated by it; found the endless slog increasingly exhausting but ever invigorating; grew tired of the boundless woods but admired their boundlessness; enjoyed the escape from civilization and ached for its comforts. All of this together, all at once, every moment, on the trail or off.”

The Top 100 Best Books Of 2017 According To Amazon (As Picked By Amazon's Book Editors)

In less than two months, we are going to kiss 2017 an explosive goodbye. For us lovers of the printed word, it marks the beginning of the Great Look Back. It’s the time we sit down, pour a cup of coffee, and look back at the books we’ve read during the past twelve months. Which books made us fall in love? Which books made us laugh like hyenas? Which books stirred our philosophical tendencies? Which books made us realize that there’s much more to life than working ourselves to death just so we can say that we have a thick wallet? Which books made us pity the trees that have been sacrificed for their abominations of a plot? Which books inspired us to pick up a pen and scribble the skeleton of a novel, short story, or poem? Which books encouraged us to pack our bags and travel to god-knows-where destinations?

Alas, we still have two months to go before we can immerse ourselves in that Great Look Back. But the folks over at Amazon beg to differ. It’s early November but they’ve already released their best books of 2017 list. But who can blame them. They are businessmen first, book lovers second. If you have a business to run and that business involves marketing books, profit comes before passion. That’s capitalism for you. I’m not saying it’s wrong. It’s just the way it works.

Amazon, is without a doubt, the biggest mover of books online. With the holidays just around the corner, it's pretty obvious that this early announcement for their best books of 2017 is to encourage people to start purchasing the titles as gifts. There are countless books that are yet to roll out this November and December. It's completely unfair that they are out of consideration for the list. Anyway, whether you consider it as a money-grab or not, it's still interesting to look into the list as chosen by Amazon's book editors. For sure, they've spent a lot of time and resources in mulling over which titles should make it to the list. So if you're looking for more titles to add to your reading pile, the list is worth checking out. Below is the complete list of the best books of 2017 (according to Amazon book editors).

1. The Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
2. Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
3. Beartown by Fredrik Backman
4. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
5. Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari
6. Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
7. The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
8. You Don't Have to Say You Love Me by Sherman Alexie
9. Sourdough by Robin Sloan
10. The Dry by Jane Harper
11. The Lost City of the Monkey God by Douglas Peterson
12. My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent
13. Ginny Moon by Benjamin Ludwig
14. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy
15. Priestdaddy: A Memoir by Patricia Lockwood
16. Spoonbenders by Daryl Gregory
17. 4321 by Paul Auster
18. This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel
19. American Fire: Love, Arson, and Life in a Vanishing Land by Monica Hesse
20. Turtles All The Way Down by John Green
21. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
22. Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
23. Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
24. Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant
25. The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

26. The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish
27. The Impossible Fortress by Jason Rekulak
28. Standard Deviation by Katherine Heiny
29. One of the Boys by Daniel Magariel
30. Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan
31. Learn Better: Mastering the Skills for Success in Life, Business, and School, or How to Become an Expert in Just About Anything by Ulrich Boser
32. Rabbit: The Autobiography of Ms. Pat by Patricia Williams and Jeannine Amber
33. Stay With Me by Ayobami Adebayo
34. Ghosts of the Tsunami: Death and Life in Japan's Disaster Zone by Richard Lloyd Parry
35. Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson
36. The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman
37. Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam by Mark Bowden
38. Prussian Blue (A Bernie Gunther Novel) by Philip Kerr
39. The Bright Hour: A Memoir of Living and Dying by Nina Riggs
40. Goodbye, Vitamin by Rachel Khong
41. Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
42. Ranger Games: A Story of Soldiers, Family, and an Inexplicable Crime by Ben Blum
43. The Burning Girl by Claire Messud
44. A Legacy of Spies by John le Carre
45. Hunger: A Memoir of My Body by Roxane Gay
46. Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery by Scott Kelly
47. Lighter Than My Shadow by Katie Green
48. Savage Country by Robert Olmstead
49. The Road to Jonestown: Jim Jones and Peoples Temple by Jeff Guinn
50. Emma in the Night by Wendy Walker
51. History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund
52. Word by Word by The Secret Life of Dictionaries by Kory Stamper
53. Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor
54. Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds
55. Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney
56. Good Me Bad Me by Ali Land
57. In the Great Green Room: The Brilliant and Bold Life of Margaret Wise Brown
58. Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman
59. Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society by Cordelia Fine
60. The Sun and Her Flowers by Rupi Kaur
61. Coming to My Senses: The Making of a Counterculture Cook by Alice Waters
62. Human Acts by Han Kang
63. Universal Harvester by John Darnielle
64. The Upstarts: How Uber, Airbnb, and the Killer Companies of the New Silicon Valley Are Changing the World by Brad Stone
65. Insomniac City: New York, Oliver, and Me by Bill Hayes
66. Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked by Adam Alter
67. All Grown Up by Jami Attenberg
68. Apollo 8: The Thrilling Story of the First Mission to the Moon by Jeffrey Kluger
69. The Rules Do Not Apply: A Memoir by Ariel Levy
70. American War by Omar El Akkad
71. The Golden House by Salman Rushdie
72. One Day We'll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter: Essays by Scaachi Koul
73. Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches by John Hodgman
74. Sycamore by Bryn Chancellor
75. American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road by Nick Bilton
76. When the English Fall by David Williams
77. The Jersey Brothers: A Missing Naval Officer in the Pacific and His Family's Quest to Bring Him Home by Sally Mott Freeman
78. The Floating World by C. Morgan Babst
79. The City of Brass: The Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty
80. The Retreat of Western Liberalism by Edward Luce
81. Sting-Ray Afternoons: A Memoir by Steve Rushin
82. Afterlife by Marcus Sakey
83. An American Family: A Memoir of Hope and Sacrifice by Khizr Khan
84. What We Lose by Zinzi Clemmons
85. Trajectory: Stories by Richard Russo
86. My Favorite Thing Is Monsters by Emil Ferris
87. The Last Cowboys of San Geronimo by Ian Stansel
88. Mrs. Fletcher by Tom Perrotta
89. Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process by John McPhee
90. The Twelve-Mile Straight by Eleanor Henderson
91. A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes by Adam Rutherford and Siddhartha Mukherjee
92. Sticky Fingers: The Life and Times of Jann Wenner and Rolling Stone Magazine
93. White Tears by Hari Kunzru
94. Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Caroline Fraser
95. Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio
96. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid
97. The Vanity Fair Diaries: 1983-1992 by Tina Brown
98. In The Midst of Winter by Isabel Allende
99. Void Star by Zachary Mason
100. Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Collection Of Kankana-ey Poems By Writer From Sagada Wins NCCA Writers' Prize

A writer/poet from the tourist town of Sagada in Mt. Province was announced as the winner in the Poetry: Kankana-ey Language category of the NCCA Writers' Prize. Gawani Domogo Gaongen earned the recognition for Sukat, a collection of poems penned in the Kankana-ey language. Gaongen received the certificate of recognition from Felipe M. De Leon Jr. (Chairman of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts) and Christine Godinez Ortega (Chairman of the NCCA's National Committee on Literary Arts) during an event recently held at Barbara's Heritage Restaurant in Intramuros, Manila. Gaongen received the certificate wearing the traditional Igorot attire.

Gaongen is one of three winners announced by the NCCA. The other two winners are Estelito Jacob in the Novel: Rinconada Language category and Ritchie Pagunsan in the Drama: Kinaray-a Language category. The winners will receive a writing grant amounting to 250,000 pesos which will assist them during the writing stage of their projects. The writing grant is part of the NCCA's mission to directly foster the development and growth of Filipino literature. The NCCA Writers' Prize is staged every two years.

Gaongen has one year to write and complete the collection of Kankana-ey poems. When completed, the manuscript should contain at least 30 poems

Image credit: National Commission fro Culture and the Arts

What is the NCCA Writers' Prize?

"The NCCA Writers’ Prize is a biennial award given to five (5) writers, one for each category. For 2015, the award will be given to following categories: Poetry (Kankana-ey language), Novel (Rinconada language), Essay (Meranao language), Short Story (Kapampangan language) and Drama (Kinaray-a language). The award, in the gross amount of TWO HUNDRED FIFTY THOUSAND PESOS (PhP250,000), will assist the winner during the writing stage of the project. The award is good for one year, after which a manuscript of the writing project will be submitted to the NCCA for possible publication or staging." [Source]

Read An Excerpt From Maria Konnikova's Book "The Confidence Game: Why We Fall For It Every Time"

"The simple truth is that most people aren’t out to get you. We are so bad at spotting deception because it’s better for us to be more trusting. Trust, and not adeptness at spotting deception, is the more evolutionarily beneficial path. People are trusting by nature. We have to be. As infants, we need to trust that the big person holding us will take care of our needs and desires until we’re old enough to do it ourselves. And we never quite let go of that expectation." - Maria Konnikova

Why are people so quick to fall for the deceptions of con artists? And why are con artists so effective in what they do? These are the two main questions that the Russian-American journalist Maria Konnikova explores in her bestselling book The Confidence Game: Why We Fall For It Every Time. Using psychology as her main tool, Konnikova paints a compelling picture of the minds, motives, and methods of con artists as well as the people who fall for the same tactics over and over again.

The Confidence Game was published in January 2016 by Viking, an imprint of the Penguin Publishing Group. You can read an excerpt from the book here [as it appeared on a recent issue of the Skeptic magazine]. You can also find more excerpts from the book on Amazon here. Konnikova is also the author of Mastermind: How To Think Like Sherlock Holmes (2013). The author's writing has appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers including The New Yorker (she writes a regular column here), The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, The Boston Globe, Wired, Slate, and The Wall Street Journal. Learn more about the writer at her official website here.

The Angriest Comedian In The Universe

This is a short review of Lewis Black’s book Nothing’s Sacred. It was first published in 2005 by Simon Spotlight Entertainment, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. The book was praised by George Carlin and Jon Stewart, two legendary humorists, so it should be good, right? Well, sort of. It depends on how exposed you are to Black’s work before you start perusing the first page.

I say this because if you’ve seen Black’s comedy specials (most of which are available for free viewing on YouTube), a lot of them are mirrors of what you’ll read in the book. Needless to say, the book would be less funny because you’ve heard a lot of the jokes before. But if you’re starting to navigate Black’s universe, then you’re in for a treat. Black is one of the funniest comedians in America, if not the world, today. Period. Nothing’s Sacred is also special in a way because Black spends a lot of the pages talking about his childhood, his first attempts with stand-up comedy, and how he got to where he is today.

I remember the time I became aware of Black’s brand of humor. It was on YouTube. I was searching for videos about evolution and somehow through YouTube’s recommendation algorithm, I came across a 10-minute video of him roasting creationists and describing them as a group that watches The Flintstones as if it’s a documentary. He delivers his jokes with a forced anger in his voice. It was unique. I haven’t seen anything like it. I was hooked. I’ve been a huge Black fan ever since.

Here’s Black being friendly and all in the book’s dedication page: “This book is dedicated to all of my friends who helped me get to where I am today. You know who you are. And when I find you, I am going to kill you.”

Notes On Francis Slakey's To The Last Breath: A Memoir Of Going To Extremes

To The Last Breath by Francis Slakey is the first book I finished reading this year. I can only think of one word to describe the experience of thumbing through the 252-page memoir. Beautiful. It was a beautiful experience. Slakey is a storyteller of the highest order. The man has the magic touch when it comes to churning out words to convey a point.

For instance, when talking about body bulk as a liability in mountain climbing, he explained that "Goliaths don't rule the rock, Davids do."

In the blurb in the inside cover of the book, it said that Slakey is a physics professor at Georgetown University. With that said, I was expecting a book filled with chapters brewing with technical jargon and dense writing. The type of content you'll peruse in scientific and academic journals.

Suffice it to say that I was completely wrong. To The Last Breath was easy to read and as I mentioned earlier, Slakey is a fantastic storyteller. As you read through his accounts of his travels and experiences, you'll feel like you are right there with him. Scaling the formidable El Capitan at the Yosemite Valley in California. Interacting with the Masai warriors in Tanzania. Reaching the summit of Mt. Everest. Staring down the barrel of a gun in the jungles of Indonesia. Watching a Sherpa give up and wait to die in the snows of Everest. Climbing the Vinson Massif in Antarctica. Surfing in Arugam Bay. Helping victims of a deadly ambush in Indonesia find justice and closure. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Slakey joins the ranks of the likes of Carl Sagan, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Bill Nye, and E.O. Wilson. Men of science who have the ability to bridge science and literature to produce a piece of work that people from all walks of life can find entertaining and informative.
Slakey has some funny bones as well. You could say that his brand of comedy is unoriginal because most of the humorous stuff in To The Last Breath are mere accounts of weird and bizarre things he has encountered in his adventures. Be that as it may, we can't discount the fact that Slakey's presentation of the scenes makes them even funnier.

Take for instance the moment Slakey met a Masai warrior named Kilembu in Tanzania. Slakey described the moment as follows: "Kilembu introduces me to the key elements of his world in descending order of importance: two dozen cattle, a few goats, four children, three tiny huts, two wives, a mother." Don't tell me you haven't guffawed at the joke in this.

Then there was Slakey's interaction with yet another man from the Masai tribe. Slakey quizzed the man about modern education being imposed upon young Masai tribe members. The Masai man was telling Slakey: "Let me tell you about one of the best brains in Tanzania. Very brilliant with mathematics. He went to Britain to study aircraft design. He came back, and you know what? We don't design airplanes here." Slakey and the man erupted in laughter as the latter delivers the clincher: "He is useless."

But the most endearing attribute of To The Last Breath is its humanity. Sure, Slakey's adventures in the highest mountains in the planet and his numerous brushes with death are exciting and endlessly entertaining. But these can't beat Slakey's journey from a detached and insensitive person to one with a more open heart and mind. You have to read the book to fully grasp what I'm trying to say here. If there is such a thing as a book with a heart, this would be it.

The face of the El Capitan in the Yosemite Valley. Photo by Greg Jordan via Flickr.

The following quote from Kathleen Norris which appears on a page on the book before the first chapter begins perfectly encapsulates the main thesis of To The Last Breath: "None of us knows what the next change is going to be, what unexpected opportunity is just around the corner, waiting a few months or a few years, to change all the tenor of our lives."