Monstress: Stories

Lysley Tenorio

Jan 2012 · Harper Collins

About this ebook

A San FranciscoChronicle Book of the Year: Short stories of Filipino American life that are “poignant, imaginative, somehow sad and funny all at once” (Anthony Doerr, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of All the Light We Cannot See).

Set among the Filipino-American communities of California and the Philippines, Monstress is the debut story collection of a breathtaking new literary talent. Already the recipient of a Pushcart Prize, a Whiting Award, and a Stegner Fellowship, Lysley Tenorio brilliantly explores the need to find connections, the melancholy of isolation, and the sometimes suffocating ties of family in tales that range from a California army base to a steamy movie house in Manila to the dangerous false glitter of Hollywood.

“Tenorio’s stories are built on unique—even outrageous—premises. Yet he manages to make fabulous setups plausible through his meticulous crafting, deeply imagining the lives of a memorable cast of eccentrics.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“Tenorio’s stories, set amid mingling nationalities and generations, prompt comparisons to the works of Junot Díaz and Jhumpa Lahiri.” —Los Angeles Times

“The debut of an electric literary talent. Brilliantly quirky, often moving, always gorgeously told.” —Chang-Rae Lee, New York Times–bestselling author of My Year Abroad

“A wonderful story collection that’s as wide and rich and complex as the geography it spans.” —Ben Fountain, PEN/Hemingway award–winning author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk

“A deep and original writer . . . simply a beautiful book.” —Jessica Hagedorn, National Book Award finalist and author of Dogeaters

Ratings and reviews

These stories can gut-punch with subtlety, & challenges you, dares you to complete the endings gathered from your own life experiences. Read it. Thank me later.

Enjoyed some stories. Some a bit too weird for me.

Pko

About the author

Lysley Tenorio is the author of the novel The Son of Good Fortune and the story collection Monstress, named a book of the year by the San Francisco Chronicle. He is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, a Whiting Award, a Stegner fellowship, and the Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as residencies from the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, and the Bogliasco Foundation. His stories have appeared in the Atlantic, Zoetrope: All-Story, and Ploughshares, and have been adapted for the stage by The American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco and the Ma-Yi Theater in New York City. He is a professor at Saint Mary’s College of California.