March reading wrap-up 📚
where I read women authors only
Hi friends,
2025 is election year here in the Philippines. I don't work myself up until March for the May elections for my sanity's sake. And so, I spent a significant time in March researching about our senatorial candidates. A major political event has also taken place in our country - the arrest of former President Duterte by the International Criminal Court. With these goings-on, reflections in our current political climate trickle down in my reviews. Because what is a book review, or any review for that matter, but writing your experience about a particular thing at a particular date and time.
Everything I Read in March
In March I read women authors only to celebrate Women’s Month. I am also quite surprised that I read 7 books this March, same as January and February. Lucky number 7! Is the universe telling me that I’m finally gonna win the lottery? Hmmm.
Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree and translated by Daisy Rockwell
Tomb of Sand is the 2022 International Booker Prize winner. It's about the journey of 80 year old Ma who becomes depressed after the death of her husband. Most of Part 1 is about Ma lying in bed with no intention of getting up. Most of the action in Part 1 is centered around the family's qualms surrounding Ma's depression which serves as an effective tool for us to get to know Ma’s family. Part 2 is about Ma's friendship with Rosie, a hijra. A lot of it takes place in Beti's house, Ma's daughter. We get to see the day-to-day domestic life of Beti, Ma, and Rosie. I loved reading this part. Made me feel like I was living with them too. Part 3 is where Ma travels to Pakistan with Beti where Ma lived as a girl. There's not a lot of plot in Parts 1 and 2 but everything comes full circle in Part 3. In Part 3, we see Ma’s unresolved traumas related to the India and Pakistan partition and she wants to confront them all before she dies. This reminds me of how our parents are their own persons and not just accessories to our lives. They had their own lives before us.
What I love about reading literature from neighboring countries is the joy in finding similarities between our culture and values, most especially relationships inside the family unit. As you all may already know, Asian family units are largely extended. Our families extend beyond the nuclear family. I myself have a very large extended family. It's fun but it has its own disadvantages. I love reading how this family dynamic fare in other cultures. This is one of the reason why I had enjoyed reading this book despite of its length and writing style.
The writing is strange and sometimes I don't understand what I'm reading but there are so many moments of beautiful writing. When you think Shree's writing is about one thing, it's actually about something else. For example, there's a chapter where Shree talks about how customs start, then it turns into a mythological story about robins but then it's actually about colonialism! There's this scene where Shree introduces a foreigner guest but she's actually talking about white supremacy. She writes about Rebooks but turns it into a caution against consumerism. However, I will say that this writing style has its disadvantages. Paragraphs and chapters can really get wordy with topics digressing from the original narrative. I feel like sometimes the story loses its focus as some topics just go on and on. This book is not for the impatient. But it's not like Shree has not warned us about it. In the first paragraph of the book she says,
The setting sun gathers fragments of tales and fashions them into glowing lanterns that hang suspended from clouds. These too will join our story. The story’s path unfurls, not knowing where it will stop, tacking to the right and left, twisting and turning, allowing anything and everything to join in the narration.
All throughout the book she reminds us of this. She warns us that there will be a lot of twists and turns in this book. And so, if ever you decide to read this book, bear this in mind to have the right mindset diving in. The book is challenging but if you're up for it and give it your full focus, it will be rewarding.
This book is a lot of things. It's about climate change, colonialism, borders, consumerism among a few. I've read that this book is also a critic on upper middle-class society but that just flew over my head.
The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story by Olga Tokarczuk and translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones
In 1913 Görbersdorf, Mieczysław Wojnicz arrives to be treated in a sanatorium in Lower Silesia. During his stay, he takes up a room in a guesthouse for gentlemen run by Wilhelm Opitz and meets other patients including the Catholic professor Longis Lukas, the Viennese socialist and writer August August, the German fine arts student of Thilo von Hahn and theosophist and privy counselor Frommer. Every night after dinner and after drinking Schwärmerei, the gentlemen discuss philosophical topics including religion, culture, and politics. But ultimately, their conversation end on one topic every single night - the inferiority of women. Amid all these goings-on on Görbersdorf, mysterious beings observe them in the shadows, seemingly waiting for something.
The book has a collective "we" narrator. It felt very creepy and effective for a horror story. I feel like I was following an omnipresent spirit observing the inhabitants of Gorsbresf. The pacing of this book is slow and nothing much ever happens although there are suspense here and there. I was so curious on how all the things will play out.
I’ve encountered so many reviews already before I even read this book (as what happens when a popular author releases a new book) that I’m afraid my words will merely be an echo of the reviews that came before. Like many other readers, I was half disgusted and half cackling at the ridiculousness of the gentlemen’s conversations regarding the inferiority of women. All of which, by the way, were paraphrased from actual texts written by distinguished and well-respected men which Tokarczuk lists in the acknowledgements.
While I loved reading this, I wasn't really mind blown. It was not the best choice to start with Tokarczuk. However, I am looking forward to read her other works. I also just want to share these creepy pictures that were in my copy. So good.
Human Acts by Han Kang and translated by Deborah Smith
Human Acts is a story about a boy named Dong-ho during the Gwangju uprising in 1980. The book is told in six different points of view by six characters connected to Dong-ho. Each story is structured differently with different forms, perspective, and narration. Rather than writing a historical account of the uprising, Han Kang writes about the experiences of her characters after the uprising along with flashbacks during the uprising. In this way, she tells us the devastating effects it had on the survivors. The stories talk about survivor's guilt, a mother's grief, and one's struggle to face trauma among others. Of the six stories, it's Dong-ho's friend and Dong-ho's mother's story I sobbed the most. But I think the strongest story of all is The Writer's chapter. Han Kang inserts herself in this chapter and through the last three lines of the book she describes the effect of Dong-ho's story on her and the reason why she needed to tell this story.
Without realizing it, I'd been kneeling in a snowdrift that covered Dong-ho's grave. The snow had soaked through my socks, seeping in right through my skin. I stared, mute, at that flame's wavering outline, fluttering like a bird's translucent wing.
It was reported that when Han Kang was writing this book, she could sometimes write only three lines a day because of the emotional toll in discovering and writing about this harrowing event. One of the characters in the book is one survivor's reluctance to confront her trauma and share her story. But Han Kang tells us is to share your story, put it on paper, record it, so that history will not repeat itself. And that is why this book is her most cherished work.
While reading this book, I can't help but also think of several wide-spread killings that happened here in the Philippines under two different Presidents. One is during the Marcos dictatorship during 1972 to 1981. To add salt to the wound, Marcos’ son is our current president. The son and other living family members rewrote history by portraying his father as the best President we ever had through social media disinformation, appealing to the younger generations who never experienced the atrocities. He won a landslide victory largely because their social media strategy was very effective but also because there’s not enough literature about the brutality of the Marcos regime and it’s a topic that’s just passively taught in school.
Second, is former president Duterte's supposedly "war on drugs". A made-up enemy he created to advance his propaganda or cover something sinister. He had gained so many followers because of this propaganda that he remains popular despite killing over 6,000 people. All of without due process and mostly only suspects.
I am glad this is the first Han Kang book I read. Even though I haven't read any of her other works yet, I can say that Human Acts represent most of her work. In the words of The Nobel Prize in Literature, "for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical trauma and exposes the fragility of human life". That phrase is exactly what describes Human Acts. Poetic and harrowing.
Rouge by Mona Awad
Rouge starts with Belle attending her estranged mother's funeral. We see her grappling with her mother's mysterious death and her mother's mental state before her death. Soon after the funeral, she receives an invitation from the exclusive spa her mother was a member of. There, night after night, she finds herself entranced and lured by the promises of the spa. Same as her mother right before her death.
I think from the cover you can easily surmise that this book is about a beauty obsession gone wrong. It is. Let me borrow Vogue's blurb because it has the perfect description of this book, "An edgy fable on the perils of our modern fascination with beauty". But not only that, it delves into trauma, internalized self-loathing, impossible beauty standards set by society, and many other damaging causes of our obsession with beauty.
This book also explores a complex mother-daughter relationship. It tells us how parents can sometimes subconsciously pass on damaging words, traits, and behaviors to children. Children can pick up on dark things without any adult explicitly saying them. This book is a warning sign to protect our children from predators because they are everywhere and can be anything.
I love the fairy tale aspect of this book - the dead father protecting the daughter from afar, the magic shoes, and the evil witch that lures children, all that. I loved the creepy gothic atmosphere this book gives of from the get-go. It's a book I love to get lost in and call in sick at work so that I can binge it. It was exactly what I needed after reading Human Acts. My only problem with this book was that it was a little bit pricey from the usual book price plus it's not something I will reread.
Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins
Tell me any millennial reader who wasn’t excited about this book drop but proceeds to to forget about the release date. That was me. I was so excited for this book since the start of 2025 but I totally forgot about the March 18 release date. Good thing my friend Z reminded me.
Sunrise on the Reaping is the fifth book in the Hunger Games series. It tells the story of 16 year old Haymitch Abernathy and how he won the 50th Hunger Games and Second Quarter Quell. Reading this book felt like I was 17 again getting lost in the plot and only emerging after hours and hours of reading. Reading Sunrise on the Reaping is the opposite of social media’s quick dopamine shot. This book really made me happy-sob that made me smile a long, long time. There were also lots of Easter eggs which I know I know a lot of Hunger Games fans loved.
Suzanne Collins starts with a quote from 1984. From that first page alone I know that this is going to be a great book. Other than giving us Haymitch’s backstory, the book gives an important message on the use of propaganda, the power of media (social or not), implicit submission, and on what’s reality and what’s not. All important themes to discuss considering the world’s current political climate. How soon can we declare a book to be a modern classic? Because The Hunger Games series is so ready for it.
There were also several different quotes that stuck with me. One is from a major character’s dialogue about Haymitch’s failure to bring one of his plans to fruition.
You were capable of imagining a different future. And maybe it won’t be realized today, maybe not in our lifetime. Maybe it will take generations. We’re all part of a continuum. Does that make it pointless?
This line reminded me of our 2022 presidential elections where Filipinos were united against a common enemy, the son of a former dictator, a man who was very much aware of the atrocities of his father at that time, was running for President. The same person I was talking about in Human Acts. What was significant during this election was a lot of apolitical Filipinos have woken up. They will not have history repeat itself. This, in turn, provided the seeds for a smarter, more aware, and more educated Filipino voter.
Another quote I loved is by Lenore Dove discussing why she believes the end of The Hunger Games is possible.
And that’s part of the trouble. Thinking things are inevitable. Not believing change is possible.
So many Filipinos are like this, including me at several points in my life. Not thinking that there’s hope for better political leaders. Thinking that one corrupt leader will just be replaced by another one. That things will not change. That things will always be the same no matter who sits there. I didn’t vote for several years because of this thinking. Until the 2022 elections.
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
This is my third time reading Station Eleven and I still get so much out of it after all this time. Station Eleven is a post apocalyptic novel telling the stories of survivors of a pandemic as they attempt to rebuild their world anew while holding on to the best of the old world.
Since my guest post with
, there had a been a push and pull inside me to reread Station Eleven again or start a new book. One day I was so angry at what I saw on social media that I reached for Station Eleven for comfort. While reading Station Eleven hasn’t totally dissipated my anger, the anger still lurking at every edge of my thought, I was glad to have my mind elsewhere.I still believe everything I wrote back in my 2023 review and I’ve also found new things. For example, right off the bat, the writing is atmospheric. It starts with a dream-like King Lear production. I didn’t notice this during my past two readings. Maybe because I was in a hurry to get started with the book. But now I kind of took my time reading it because I was already familiar with the story.
Also, how timely it is to have read this book again five years after the pandemic. As I sit in my couch reading the book, I think about how the world in Station Eleven collapsed but ours didn’t. In the book, even Year 20 into the fall of civilization, the road is still a dangerous place to be. But here I am comfortable like I have never been before with the life I have built for myself. Reading Station Eleven makes me grateful for the life I have. It’s not perfect but it’s enough. I have everything I need and everything else will be given to me in time.
I also kept thinking about how this book explores sonder - the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own. Kirsten, Jeevan, and Miranda all have moments of awareness of the vast, unique lives of others, emphasizing the interconnectedness of humanity and the fragility of civilization. I feel a profound sense of calm reading these moments.
The Kindness of Birds by Merlinda Bobis
The Kindness of Birds is a collection of inter-connected stories about kindness. The stories are set in the Philippines and multi-cultural Australia. Women are at the heart of these stories. We read their grief, guilt, struggle, and resistance. I liked the first few stories much more than the latter ones. One story tackles a taboo conversation here in the Philippines about money. One story taught me so much about a relatively unknown revolutionary, Candido Iban, who played a major role in the Philippine revolution against Spain. One story reminded me of my paternal grandmother who I misunderstood to be unkind when I was young. It was only last year when I chatted with my older cousins, adults already when my grandmother was still alive, that there was more to her than what I remembered. That she was strong, ambitious, and financially independent despite her being a single mother before she met my grandfather. Coincidentally, the character's name in the story was the same as that of my grandmother.
The literary prose in this book is a hit or miss for me. Sometimes it’s really good, taking my breath away, and leaving me teary-eyed. But sometimes, it was trying to hard. Nevertheless, I enjoyed my time reading this.
Have you read any of the books I mentioned above? If yes, let me know which ones and if you liked them.
What I Want to Read in April
Here’s everything I want to read in April. Not in the picture is The Iguana by Anna Maria Ortese and an ARC if I ever come to it.
In case you missed this..
Last month I wrote a guest post for Reads with Alicia about growing as a reader. If you haven’t read it yet, please check it out and let me know what you think.
Previous monthly wrap-ups
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What a great wrap-up, Jam! I wasn't planning to read the new Hunger Games book, but you might have just convinced me to.
Lovely read, Jam! Will pick up Human Acts next time im in the bookstore. Also happy that Glenn Diaz is next in line. I've been meaning to read more Filo authors for this year as well.