The Vanished
2023
19th Avenida Publishing House
About the author:
Chuckberry J. Pascual is a novelist, short story writer, and translator. He is the author of the young adult novel Mars, May Zombie! (Adarna House, 2022) and the short story collections Kumpisal: mga kuwento (University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, 2015), Hindi Ito Romansa (Sentro ng Wikang Filipino-UP Diliman, 2020), Bayan ng mga Bangkay (University of the Philippines Press, 2022), and Ang Nawawala (Visprint, 2017). Kumpisal: mga kuwento won the San Alberto Magno Best Book Award in the Dangal ng UST Awards in 2016. Ang Nawawala ( The Vanished) won Best Book of Short Fiction in Filipino in the National Book Awards 2018 and the San Alberto Magno Best Book in the Dangal ng UST Awards 2019. Its English translation by Ned Parfan, The Vanished (Avenida Books, 2023), received a translation grant from the National Book Development Board.
He has also authored books on ethnography, literary criticism, and literary history such as Pagpasok sa Eksena: Ang Sinehan sa Panitikan at Pag-aaral ng Piling Sinehan sa Recto (University of the Philippines Press, 2016) Ang Labis na Mahalaga (UNITAS, 2023) and Ang Tagalabas sa Panitikan (University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, 2018). His translation of Miguel Syjuco’s Ilustrado (University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, 2022), the first and only Filipino novel to win the Man Asian Prize, received a translation grant from the National Book Development Board. Currently, Pascual teaches Literature and Creative Writing at the UST Faculty of Arts and Letters and the UST Graduate School. He also serves as a Resident Fellow of the UST Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies, and as a Faculty Researcher of the UST Research Center for Culture, Arts and Humanities.
The translator:
Ned Parfan has two books of poetry, The Murmu Asylum and Tilt Me and I Bend, both published by the University of the Philippines Press. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from De La Salle University-Manila and is an assistant professor at the University of Santo Tomas.
About the book:
Book title: The Vanished
Publisher: 19th Avenida Publishing House
Year: 2023
Language: English
Extent 197
Size (mm) 215.9 x 139.7
Format Paperback / softback
ISBN 9786218264250
Keywords Crime and Mystery
The Vanished (Ang Nawawala) is a comic, queer, and Filipino take on the detective novella. It comprises seven interconnected stories featuring the exploits of Brigido aka “Bree,” a gay masseur and barangay (village) hall receptionist turned unlikely detective. Each story involves a case that needs to be solved, a search for a missing item or person, and is titled as such: the missing milkfish, the missing knives, the missing ring, the missing angel (the “angel” refers to a little girl who plays the role in the Salubong [Encounter], a religious play held during Holy Week that dramatizes the encounter of the Blessed Virgin and the newly-risen Christ), the missing faces, the missing doves, and the missing umbrella. Bree’s search for these small, seemingly inconsequential objects and persons unearths other issues and crimes in the barangay (village) of Talong Punay. A barangay is the smallest administrative division in the Philippines and therefore, serves as a microcosm of contemporary Philippine
The book transports the reader to a realm where dwellers possess seemingly mundane traits which largely reflect the social, cultural, and economic milieu in which they survive and into which they infuse their loves, fears, and ingenuities. Barangay Talong Punay provides the setting of the social interactions that knit the dwellers together, the tiny nearly invisible fibers of their relationships, the food that they eat, how their houses and yards are laid out, the economic arrangements among the poor and the not-so-poor, the loyalties, enmities, affections, and quarrels that they bear, the humorous and comic situations that bring them together that create laughter. In this book readers would most certainly find answers to the questions: What is comic or tragic among this group of Filipinos? What is “pathetic and beautiful” about their lives? Bree as the protagonist of the interlinked stories is a credible and sometimes flawed, certainly unlike the pigeon-hole gay character, and it is easy to imagine more of him taking chances in quite possibly future sequels of the book.
The book is originally written in Filipino titled “Ang Nawawala” and translated into English by Ned Parfan. The original work in Tagalog had seen 2,700 copies which are now sold out. The English translation is now on sale. The publisher 19th Avenida Press is dedicated to indie publication with several best sellers.
For further information please contact:
Nida Ramirez
Owner/Proprietor
19th Avenida Publishing House
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: 19th Avenida Publishing House
Instagram: myavenidaph