She has written a comics biography Illustrated by Tom Knight of the explorer Ferdinand Magellan, who happens to be credited with “discovering” the Philippines. Her latest book is Mike Falls Up, illustrated by Carles Ballesteros, a portal fantasy for young readers beginning to explore beyond picture books. It took her years to learn that Filipino stories too, belong in the pages of books. Growing up, she wondered why books only featured pink-skinned children who lived in worlds that didn’t resemble her tropical home in Manila. Happy goodreading!Ĭandy Gourlay was born in the Philippines, grew up under a dictatorship and met her husband during a revolution. This is a book to recommend – accessible, exciting and challenging.Hello Goodreaders! If you'd like news about me and my books, do check out my website where I blog now and then, or subscribe to my profile on Instagram. Here she boldly takes her readers into a very different world, a past that is both specific yet universal.
Gourlay is an accomplished novelist who looks to explore different challenges in every book, all springing from her own background. The isolation – even the tribes have little real knowledge of each other – the lush landscape, and presiding over all the Tree of Bones, the avatar guiding thoughts and ideas. Pervading the novel is the sense of place. But Samkad is a boy we can recognise, telling his story with an immediacy that opens a door to understanding. Superficially they are unfamiliar, strange perhaps. We see their beliefs, their preoccupations, their practices through Samkad’s eyes. Gourlay introduces us to Samkad and his people still living according to the patterns that have been followed for ages. This is a story that does not appear in our history books – but the parallels are clear. Samkad suddenly finds himself facing terrifying new ideas …as he says “I had not known it possible for there to be people with hair a colour other than black…”īooks – stories – can take the reader anywhere and here Candy Gourlay transports us to the other side of the world, the Philippines. But his journey to the Tree of Bones is not smooth his life is turned upside down when an American arrives in the village. Samkad is elated and nervous his father has just told him he is become a man. What happens when two cultures meet head on? It is 1899, Bontok in the Cordilleras in the Philippines.
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