TRAVELS (and more) WITH

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WHILE IN MY BLOGSITE.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 28, 2018

Magnificence -- Short Story by Estrella D. Alfon - Writer from Cebu,

Philippines

MAGNIFICENCE
Short Story by
ESTRELLA D. ALFON

There was nothing to fear, for the man was always so gentle, so kind. At night when the
little girl and her brother were bathed in the light of the big shaded bulb that hung over
the big study table in the downstairs hall, the man would knock gently on the door, and
come in. he would stand for a while just beyond the pool of light, his feet in the circle of
illumination, the rest of him in shadow. The little girl and her brother would look up at
him where they sat at the big table, their eyes bright in the bright light, and watch him
come fully into the light, but his voice soft, his manner slow. He would smell very faintly
of sweat and pomade, but the children didn’t mind although they did notice, for they
waited for him every evening as they sat at their lessons like this. He’d throw his visored
cap on the table, and it would fall down with a soft plop, then he’d nod his head to say
one was right, or shake it to say one was wrong.

It was not always that he came. They could remember perhaps two weeks when he
remarked to their mother that he had never seen two children looking so smart. The
praise had made their mother look over them as they stood around listening to the
goings-on at the meeting of the neighborhood association, of which their mother was
president. Two children, one a girl of seven, and a boy of eight. They were both very tall
for their age, and their legs were the long gangly legs of fine spirited colts. Their mother
saw them with eyes that held pride, and then to partly gloss over the maternal gloating
she exhibited, she said to the man, in answer to his praise, But their homework. They’re
so lazy with them. And the man said, I have nothing to do in the evenings, let me help
them. Mother nodded her head and said, if you want to bother yourself. And the thing
rested there, and the man came in the evenings therefore, and he helped solve fractions
for the boy, and write correct phrases in language for the little girl.

In those days, the rage was for pencils. School children always have rages going at one
time or another. Sometimes for paper butterflies that are held on sticks, and whirr in the
wind. The Japanese bazaars promoted a rage for those. Sometimes it is for little lead
toys found in the folded waffles that Japanese confection-makers had such light hands
with. At this particular time, it was for pencils. Pencils big but light in circumference not
smaller than a man’s thumb. They were unwieldy in a child’s hands, but in all schools
then, where Japanese bazaars clustered there were all colors of these pencils selling for
very low, but unattainable to a child budgeted at a baon of a centavo a day. They were all
of five centavos each, and one pencil was not at all what one had ambitions for. In rages,
one kept a collection. Four or five pencils, of different colors, to tie with strings near the
eraser end, to dangle from one’s book-basket, to arouse the envy of the other children
who probably possessed less.
Add to the man’s gentleness and his kindness in knowing a child’s desires, his promise
that he would give each of them not one pencil but two. And for the little girl who he
said was very bright and deserved more, ho would get the biggest pencil he could find.

One evening he did bring them. The evenings of waiting had made them look forward to
this final giving, and when they got the pencils they whooped with joy. The little boy had
tow pencils, one green, one blue. And the little girl had three pencils, two of the same
circumference as the little boy’s but colored red and yellow. And the third pencil, a
jumbo size pencil really, was white, and had been sharpened, and the little girl jumped
up and down, and shouted with glee. Until their mother called from down the stairs.
What are you shouting about? And they told her, shouting gladly, Vicente, for that was
his name. Vicente had brought the pencils he had promised them.

Thank him, their mother called. The little boy smiled and said, Thank you. And the little
girl smiled, and said, Thank you, too. But the man said, Are you not going to kiss me for
those pencils? They both came forward, the little girl and the little boy, and they both
made to kiss him but Vicente slapped the boy smartly on his lean hips, and said, Boys do
not kiss boys. And the little boy laughed and scampered away, and then ran back and
kissed him anyway.

The little girl went up to the man shyly, put her arms about his neck as he crouched to
receive her embrace, and kissed him on the cheeks.

The man’s arms tightened suddenly about the little girl until the little girl squirmed out
of his arms, and laughed a little breathlessly, disturbed but innocent, looking at the man
with a smiling little question of puzzlement.

The next evening, he came around again. All through that day, they had been very proud
in school showing off their brand new pencils. All the little girls and boys had been
envying them. And their mother had finally to tell them to stop talking about the pencils,
pencils, for now that they had, the boy two, and the girl three, they were asking their
mother to buy more, so they could each have five, and three at least in the jumbo size
that the little girl’s third pencil was. Their mother said, Oh stop it, what will you do with
so many pencils, you can only write with one at a time.

And the little girl muttered under her breath, I’ll ask Vicente for some more.

Their mother replied, He’s only a bus conductor, don’t ask him for too many things. It’s
a pity. And this observation their mother said to their father, who was eating his evening
meal between paragraphs of the book on masonry rites that he was reading. It is a pity,
said their mother, People like those, they make friends with people like us, and they feel
it is nice to give us gifts, or the children toys and things. You’d think they wouldn’t be
able to afford it.

The father grunted, and said, the man probably needed a new job, and was softening his
way through to him by going at the children like that. And the mother said, No, I don’t
think so, he’s a rather queer young man, I think he doesn’t have many friends, but I have
watched him with the children, and he seems to dote on them.

The father grunted again, and did not pay any further attention.

Vicente was earlier than usual that evening. The children immediately put their lessons
down, telling him of the envy of their schoolmates, and would he buy them more please?

Vicente said to the little boy, Go and ask if you can let me have a glass of water. And the
little boy ran away to comply, saying behind him, But buy us some more pencils, huh,
buy us more pencils, and then went up to stairs to their mother.

Vicente held the little girl by the arm, and said gently, Of course I will buy you more
pencils, as many as you want

And the little girl giggled and said, Oh, then I will tell my friends, and they will envy me,
for they don’t have as many or as pretty.

Vicente took the girl up lightly in his arms, holding her under the armpits, and held her
to sit down on his lap and he said, still gently, What are your lessons for tomorrow? And
the little girl turned to the paper on the table where she had been writing with the jumbo
pencil, and she told him that that was her lesson but it was easy.

Then go ahead and write, and I will watch you.

Don’t hold me on your lap, said the little girl, I am very heavy, you will get very tired.

The man shook his head, and said nothing, but held her on his lap just the same.

The little girl kept squirming, for somehow she felt uncomfortable to be held thus, her
mother and father always treated her like a big girl, she was always told never to act like
a baby. She looked around at Vicente, interrupting her careful writing to twist around.

His face was all in sweat, and his eyes looked very strange, and he indicated to her that
she must turn around, attend to the homework she was writing.

But the little girl felt very queer, she didn’t know why, all of a sudden she was immensely
frightened, and she jumped up away from Vicente’s lap.

She stood looking at him, feeling that queer frightened feeling, not knowing what to do.
By and by, in a very short while her mother came down the stairs, holding in her hand a
glass of sarsaparilla, Vicente.

But Vicente had jumped up too soon as the little girl had jumped from his lap. He
snatched at the papers that lay on the table and held them to his stomach, turning away
from the mother’s coming.

The mother looked at him, stopped in her tracks, and advanced into the light. She had
been in the shadow. Her voice had been like a bell of safety to the little girl. But now she
advanced into glare of the light that held like a tableau the figures of Vicente holding the
little girl’s papers to him, and the little girl looking up at him frightenedly, in her eyes
dark pools of wonder and fear and question.

The little girl looked at her mother, and saw the beloved face transfigured by some sort
of glow. The mother kept coming into the light, and when Vicente made as if to move
away into the shadow, she said, very low, but very heavily, Do not move.

She put the glass of soft drink down on the table, where in the light one could watch the
little bubbles go up and down in the dark liquid. The mother said to the boy, Oscar,
finish your lessons. And turning to the little girl, she said, Come here. The little girl went
to her, and the mother knelt down, for she was a tall woman and she said, Turn around.
Obediently the little girl turned around, and her mother passed her hands over the little
girl’s back.

Go upstairs, she said.

The mother’s voice was of such a heavy quality and of such awful timbre that the girl
could only nod her head, and without looking at Vicente again, she raced up the stairs.
The mother went to the cowering man, and marched him with a glance out of the circle
of light that held the little boy. Once in the shadow, she extended her hand, and without
any opposition took away the papers that Vicente was holding to himself. She stood
there saying nothing as the man fumbled with his hands and with his fingers, and she
waited until he had finished. She was going to open her mouth but she glanced at the
boy and closed it, and with a look and an inclination of the head, she bade Vicente go up
the stairs.

The man said nothing, for she said nothing either. Up the stairs went the man, and the
mother followed behind. When they had reached the upper landing, the woman called
down to her son, Son, come up and go to your room.

The little boy did as he was told, asking no questions, for indeed he was feeling sleepy
already.
As soon as the boy was gone, the mother turned on Vicente. There was a pause.

Finally, the woman raised her hand and slapped him full hard in the face. Her retreated
down one tread of the stairs with the force of the blow, but the mother followed him.
With her other hand she slapped him on the other side of the face again. And so down
the stairs they went, the man backwards, his face continually open to the force of the
woman’s slapping. Alternately she lifted her right hand and made him retreat before her
until they reached the bottom landing.

He made no resistance, offered no defense. Before the silence and the grimness of her
attack he cowered, retreating, until out of his mouth issued something like a whimper.

The mother thus shut his mouth, and with those hard forceful slaps she escorted him
right to the other door. As soon as the cool air of the free night touched him, he
recovered enough to turn away and run, into the shadows that ate him up. The woman
looked after him, and closed the door. She turned off the blazing light over the study
table, and went slowly up the stairs and out into the dark night.

When her mother reached her, the woman, held her hand out to the child. Always also,
with the terrible indelibility that one associated with terror, the girl was to remember
the touch of that hand on her shoulder, heavy, kneading at her flesh, the woman herself
stricken almost dumb, but her eyes eloquent with that angered fire. She knelt, She felt
the little girl’s dress and took it off with haste that was almost frantic, tearing at the
buttons and imparting a terror to the little girl that almost made her sob. Hush, the
mother said. Take a bath quickly.

Her mother presided over the bath the little girl took, scrubbed her, and soaped her, and
then wiped her gently all over and changed her into new clothes that smelt of the clean
fresh smell of clothes that had hung in the light of the sun. The clothes that she had
taken off the little girl, she bundled into a tight wrenched bunch, which she threw into
the kitchen range.
Take also the pencils, said the mother to the watching newly bathed, newly changed
child. Take them and throw them into the fire. But when the girl turned to comply, the
mother said, No, tomorrow will do. And taking the little girl by the hand, she led her to
her little girl’s bed, made her lie down and tucked the covers gently about her as the girl
dropped off into quick slumber.

~end~

BIO courtesy of  Panitikan 

Estrella Alfon, who hailed from Cebu, was born on 1917. She is a well-known storywriter,
playwright and journalist; and though a Cebuana, she wrote almost exclusively in English.
Unlike other writers of her time, she did not come from the intelligensia. She attended college,
and studied medicine; however, when she was mistakenly diagnosed with tuberculosis and sent
to a sanitarium, she resigned from her pre-medical education, and left with an Associate of Arts
degree from the University of the Philippines. In spite of having only an A.A. degree, she was
eventually appointed as a professor of Creative Writing at the University of
thePhilippines, Manila. She was a member of the U.P. Writers Club, she held the National
Fellowship in Fiction post at the U.P. Creative Writing Center in 1979.
            She became a member of the U. P. Writers Club and was given the privileged post of
National Fellowship in Fiction post at the U. P. Creative Writing Center. Her first story, Grey
Confetti, was published in graphic in 1935.

            She was the only female member of the Veronicans, an avant garde group of writers in
the 1930s led by Francisco Arcellana and H.R. Ocampo, she was also regarded as their muse.
The Veronicans are recognized as the first group of Filipino writers to write almost exclusively
in English and were formed prior to the World War II. She is also reportedly the most prolific
Filipina writer prior to World War II. She was a regular contributor to Manila-based national
magazines; she had several stories cited in Jose Garcia Villa’s annual honor rolls. She also
served on the Philippine Board of Tourism in the 1970s.

~~

Images from Wikipedia and grabbed from the Internet for educational purposes.

Tags: #Cebu #literature #fiction #story #writer #Cebuano #Author #goodreads

Read also:

 Guest Blogger, Jon Pineda, poem "Matamis"

 Guest Blogger, Lysley Tenorio, "The View from Culion
 Guest Blogger: Linda Ty Casper "In Place of Trees"
 Guest Blogger, Luisa A. Igloria, "Poems on Haiyan"
 Guest Blogger, Brian Ascalon Roley, "Old Man"
 Guest Blogger, Erlinda Kravetz, "Song from the Mountain
 Fiction - The Old Mansion Near the Plaza, Novel Excerpt  by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 Fiction/Short Story by Cecilia Brainard "Romeo"
 Fiction - The Turkish Seamstress in Ubec, by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 Fiction - Flip Gothic, by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 Fiction - Manila Without Verna, by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 Fiction - Winning Hearts and Minds, by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

POSTED BY CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD AT 12:21 PM 

CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD

CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD'S OFFICIAL WEBSITE IS CECILIABRAINARDDOTCOM. SHE IS THE

AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR AND EDITOR OF 22 BOOKS, INCLUDING WHEN THE RAINBOW GODDESS

WEPT, THE NEWSPAPER WIDOW, MAGDALENA, SELECTED STORIES, VIGAN AND OTHER STORIES,

AND MORE. SHE EDITED GROWING UP FILIPINO 1 & 2, FICTION BY FILIPINOS IN AMERICA,

CONTEMPORARY FICTION BY FILIPINOS IN AMERICA, AND OTHER BOOKS.. HER WORK HAS BEEN

TRANSLATED INTO FINNISH AND TURKISH; AND MANY OF HER STORIES AND ARTICLES HAVE BEEN

WIDELY ANTHOLOGIZED. CECILIA HAS RECEIVED MANY AWARDS, INCLUDING A CALIFORNIA ARTS

COUNCIL FELLOWSHIP IN FICTION, A BRODY ARTS FUND AWARD, A SPECIAL RECOGNITION AWARD

FOR HER WORK DEALING WITH ASIAN AMERICAN YOUTHS, AS WELL AS A CERTIFICATE OF

RECOGNITION FROM THE CALIFORNIA STATE SENATE, 21ST DISTRICT, AND THE OUTSTANDING

INDIVIDUAL AWARD FROM HER BIRTH CITY, CEBU, PHILIPPINES. SHE HAS LECTURED AND

PERFORMED AT UCLA, USC, UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT, UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES,

PEN, SHAKESPEARE & COMPANY IN PARIS, AND MANY OTHERS. SHE HAS SERVED IN THE BOARD OF

LITERARY ARTS GROUPS SUCH AS PEN, PAWWA (PACIFIC ASIAN AMERICAN WRITERS WEST),

AMONG OTHERS.

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CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD

PROFILE VIEWS FIGURE INCORRECT; IT'S STUCK. THERE ARE OVER A MILLION

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Cecilia Manguerra Brainard's official website is ceciliabrainarddotcom. She is the

award-winning author and editor of 22 books, including When the Rainbow
Goddess Wept, The Newspaper Widow, Magdalena, Selected Stories, Vigan and
Other Stories, and more. She edited Growing Up Filipino 1 & 2, Fiction by
Filipinos in America, Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America, and other
books.. Her work has been translated into Finnish and Turkish; and many of her
stories and articles have been widely anthologized. Cecilia has received many
awards, including a California Arts Council Fellowship in Fiction, a Brody Arts
Fund Award, a Special Recognition Award for her work dealing with Asian
American youths, as well as a Certificate of Recognition from the California State
Senate, 21st District, and the Outstanding Individual Award from her birth city,
Cebu, Philippines. She has lectured and performed at UCLA, USC, University of
Connecticut, University of the Philippines, PEN, Shakespeare & Company in
Paris, and many others. She has served in the Board of literary arts groups such
as PEN, PAWWA (Pacific Asian American Writers West), among others.
VIEW MY COMPLETE PROFILE

FEATURE: FILIPINOS #COPINGWITHCOVID

C. Brainard's Coronavirus: The Beginning

C. Brainard, How Filipinos Are Coping With Covid, I
C. Brainard - How Filipinos Are Coping With Covid, 2
C. Brainard - How Filipinos Are Coping With Covid, 3
Tony Robles - An Encounter with a Bee During Quarantine

Lia Feraren, Germany - Interview

Teresa Concepcion, Canada - Interview
Ofelia Gelvezon Tequi, France - Interview
Reine Marie Bonnie Melvin -- Interview
New Zealand: Jay Montilla & Monika Tawngdee. Interview
Linda Ty-Casper - Interview
Barbara Ann Jacala - San Diego, CA, USA
Brian Ascalon Roley - Ohio, USA
Interviews of Filipino Americans #CopingWithCovid
Elizabeth Ann Besa-Quirino - Interview
Cecilia Brainard - Interview by 95.9 Star FM Bacolod

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 Melancholia in Cebu by Cecilia Brainard
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CECILIA BRAINARD FICTION

 The Last Moon-Game of Summer by C. Brainard

 Vigan by C. Brainard
 1943: Tiya Octavia by C. Brainard
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 The Blue-Green Chiffon Dress by C. Brainard
 The Che Guevara Night by C. Brainard
 Christmas Eve, 1908 by C. Brainard
 The Dirty Kitchen by C. Brainard
 Flip Gothic by C. Brainard
 Friday Evening at the Seashore by C. Brainard
 Manila Without Verna by C. Brainard
 The Old Mansion Near the Plaza, novel excerpt by C. Brainard
 Romeo by C. Brainard
 Rumblings of War novel excerpt by C. Brainard
 The SS Pacifica, novel excerpt by C. Brainard
 The Syrian Doctor in Paris by C. Brainard
 The Turkish Seamstress in Ubec by C. Brainard
 A Very Short Story by C. Brainard
 Waiting for Papa's Return by C. Brainard
 Winning Hearts and Mind, novel excerpt by C. Brainard

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 Cecilia Brainard's Creative Writing Tip No. 4: Writer's Block
 Cecilia Brainard's Creative Writing Tip No. 3: Show Don't Tell
 Cecilia Brainard's Creative Writing Tip No. 2: Make a Date with Your Muse
 Cecilia Brainard's Creative Writing Tip No. 1: Sensuous Writing
 Cebu as Inspiration to My Writings by Cecilia Brainard
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 Guest Blogger: Ralph Semino Galan, poem "Lamentation"
 Guest Blogger: A Poem by Mila D. Aguilar
 Guest Blogger: Poems by Manuel Joseph Ponce
 Magnificence -- Story by Estrella D. Alfon, Writer from Cebu, Philippines
 Guest Blogger: Ralph Semino Galan, Ode to My Mom
 Guest Blogger: Celine Conejos Reviews Restaurants in Geneva, Switzerland
 Guest Blogger: Manny Gonzalez "The Most Beautiful Women in Rome"
 Guest Blogger: Celine Conejos Reviews Makati Restaurants
 Guest Blogger: Manny Gonzalez Reviews Paris Restaurants
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 Guest Blogger, Lysley Tenorio, "The View from Culion
 Guest Blogger, Julia Stein, "The Woman Disappears Bit by Bit" - poem re Iraq
War
 Guest Blogger: Linda Ty Casper "In Place of Trees"
 Guest Blogger, Luisa A. Igloria, "Poems on Haiyan"
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 Recommended Travel Reading - Literature of the Philippines
 The Link to the Amazon - Manaus, Brazil
 Salvador, Brazil - the Center of Bahian Culture
 Foz do Iguazu, Mighty Falls fo Brazil and Argentina
 Mariana and Ouro Preto - Colonial Towns in Minas Gerais, Brazil
 Falling in Love With Rio de Janeiro
 Book Review of Angelica's Daughters by Micaela Keck, Germany
 Oscar Campomanes' Article -- Cecilia Manguerra Brainard: Scenographer
 The Schools I Attended, Part 1, St. Theresa's College
 The Schools I Attended - Part 2, UP & Maryknoll
 The Schools I Attended - Part 3, UCLA
 Death of a Carnival Queen: 1912-2001
 How I Learned to Make Leche Flan (or How I Met My Husband)
 Life in Parian Now
 From Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City
 Northern India in March
 Kenya Safari: Up Close and Personal with the Bongo
 Brainard Kenya Safari-video
 The Holy Land
 Grand Tour of Egypt, Part 1
 Grand Tour of Egypt, Part 2
 Grand Tour of Egypt, Part 3
 Visit to Turkey, Part 1
 Visit toTurkey, Part 2
 Visit to Turkey, Part 3
 Visit to Turkey #4
 Visit to Turkey #5
 Visit to Turkey #6
  Visiting the American Southwest
 Visiting Colonial Mexico
 The Many Faces of Mexico
 My Love Affair With France
 Burma: Moving Forward
 Malaysia: Where Enrique of Malacca Came From
 Pre-Colonial Gold in Cebu, Philippines

EXTERNAL LINKS AND OTHER SOURCES

 Cecilia Brainard Interview in Payag Habagatan Literary Journal

 Cecilia Brainard Reads from When the Rainbow Goddess Wept - Philippine novel
 Cecilia Brainard Reads from Magdalena - Philippine novel
 Cecilia Brainard Reads from The Newspaper Widow - Philippine novel
 YouTube - Chappy Piramide Interview of Cecilia Brainard #CebuLitFest
 YouTube - Bobit Avila Interviews Novelist Cecilia Brainard Part 3 (2017)
 YouTube - Bobit Avila Interviews Novelist Cecilia Brainard Part 2 (2017)
 YouTube - Bobit Avila Interviews Novelist Cecilia Brainard Part 1 (2017)
 YouTube - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Reads at UCLA Extension's Publication
Party 2015
 YouTube - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Reads at UCLA Extension's Publication
Party 2014
 YouTube - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Reads at UCLA Extension's Publication
Party 2011
 YouTube - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Reads at UCLA Extension's Publication
Party 2010
 Interview with Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, Allison's Book Bag
 Cebuana Trailblazers, page 2
 Cecilia Brainard on Facebook
 Cecilia Brainard's Site
 Eleanor Ty's writeup on Cecilia Manguerra Brainard in Asian American Novelists,
p. 29
 Interview of Cecilia Brainard by Daniel M. Jaffe
 Interview of Cecilia Manguerra Brainard by Dana Hubler (Poets & Writers, 1997)
 PALH or Philippine American Literary House Blog
 PALH (Philippine American Literary House)
  Possibilities of Humaneness in an Age of Slaughter, by Leonard Casper (re Song
of Yvonne/When the Rainbow Goddess Wept)
 Review of Noli Me Tangere by Jose Rizal and When the Rainbow Goddess Wept
by Allen Gaborro
 The History of Filipino Women's Writings by Riita Vartti
 University of Michigan's site for When the Rainbow Goddess Wept
 University of Minnesota's Voices from the Gaps - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 What Are You Writing On - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 Who's Who of Asian Americans - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard bio
 Who's Who in Contemporary Women's Writing by Jane Eldridge Miller - Cecilia
Brainard, page 45
 Wikipedia Writeup about Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
 YouTube - Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Interview by Jeepney Books
 YouTube - Miguel Syjuco & Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, ALOUD, LA Central
Library
 YouTube-Cecilia Manguerra Brainard- Books, Pictures with Literary Writers

A LA CARTE FOOD & FICTION

Co-edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard & Marily Ysip Orosa

ACAPULCO AT SUNSET AND OTHER STORIES

Short Stories by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

ANGELICA'S DAUGHTERS, A DUGTUNGAN NOVEL

Novel Co-authored By Brainard, Cuizon, Evangelista, Montes, Sarreal

BEHIND THE WALLS

Co-edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard & Marily Ysip Orosa

CECILIA'S DIARY 1964-1968

Cecilia Brainard's early diary

CONTEMPORARY FICTION BY FILIPINOS IN AMERICA

Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

FICTION BY FILIPINOS IN AMERICA

Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

FINDING GOD: TRUE STORIES OF SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTERS

True-to-life experiences of encountering God

FUNDAMENTALS OF CREATIVE WRITING

How to Write by Cecilia Brainard

JOURNEY OF 100 YEARS

Co-edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard & Edmundo Litton

GROWING UP FILIPINO STORIES FOR YOUNG ADULTS

Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

~http://www.palhbooks.com/cbrainardgrow.html

GROWING UP FILIPINO II: MORE STORIES FOR YOUNG ADULTS (ED)

Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard http://www.palhbooks.com/cbrainardgufII.html

MADGALENA
Novel by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

MAGDALENA (PHILIPPINE EDITION)

Novel published by the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House 2017

MAGICAL YEARS: MEMORIES & SKETCHES

Special Limited pen&ink sketches by Cecilia M. Brainard

MAGNIFICAT: MAMA MARY'S PILGRIM SITES

Essays collected by Cecilia Brainard about Marian Pilgrim Sites

THE NEWSPAPER WIDOW

Novel published by the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, 2017

OUT OF CEBU: ESSAYS AND PERSONAL PROSE

Collection of 28 nonfiction essays by Cecilia M. Brainard

PHILIPPINE WOMAN IN AMERICA

Collection of Essays by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

VIGAN AND OTHER STORIES

Collection of Short Stories by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

WHEN THE RAINBOW GODDESS WEPT

Novel by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

WOMAN WITH HORNS AND OTHER STORIES

Short Story Collection by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

A LL ARTI CLES A RE COPY RI GH TED 201 6 BY CECI LI A MA NGU ERRA

BRA I NA RD . ALL RI GH TS RESERVED .

CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD

THA NKS FOR STOPPI NG BY . COME AGA I N!