Two Excellent KINKY-POIGNANT Novels

Brownouts aren't supposed to be this much fun.
NOT when they last for 76 hours in my part of Manila.

However,
with no Cable TV, DVDs, and Internet/Blogging (!) distractions,
I finally found the time to lose myself,
with much ironic gratitude to Milenyo & Meralco,
to my READING.

I teach English.
IELTS for Nurses,
Dilbert-like Psychobabble for Corporate Types,
and other various permutations of ESP,
or English for Specific Purposes.

And I've always stressed to my students
that the bedrock,
the strong foundation essential
for solid skills in English Proficiency,
has to be an appreciation,
nay,
a desire, a love, a lust for Reading.

Only through Reading can one gain an instrinsic
intuitive intelligence in the English Language;

Through Reading,
learners of English can improve their spelling skills;
see how letters, words, and punctuation are assembled
into memorable sentence and paragraph structures;

and ultimately,
through a kind of wondrous osmosis,
absorb all that they drink in through Reading,
and therefore greatly improve their Speaking & Writing skills.


It's funny, as time seemed to crawl last Thursday,
I picked up the book above,
and in a small miracle not unlike those that you read about
in South American novels of magical realism,
The Time Traveler's Wife really did make my time fly.

It's a Yo-Yo of a science fiction novel.
It's a Rubber Band of an ethereal love story.
And yes,
It's an Elastically Prophylactic kinky book.

By the light of four flickering candles,
I devoured the novel over two dark and loamy nights.

Towards the end,
I regretted the fact that there were fewer,
and fewer, and fewer, remaining pages.

Finally,
I closed the book with much reluctance,
wishing that I could read it again with fresh eyes,
for the first time once more.

It's that good.




My other favorite book of Love, Lust, and Loss
is Trevanian's masterpiece above.

Somehow,
I managed to give away at least three copies
to my ex-girlfriends.

And I always went back to the old Goodwill bookstore
in Glorietta, which seemed to have an endless supply
of old stocks of this bestseller from over 20 years ago.

Well,
the copies finally ran out.
Thankfully,
the girlfiends didn't.

But,
for the past 5 years,
I'd haunt bookstores and booksales alike,
searching in vain for The Summer of Katya.

Even amazon.com didn't have copies,
brand new nor used.
The novel was out of print.....

...until last week,
when I happily discovered that new editions
were once again available.

I've already asked my cousin Ana in NYC
to immediately get me a copy of this Neruda-ish novel.

And perhaps,
given my propensity for dispensing copies of this book
like candy favors for my *ahem!* friends,
I should order a couple of extra copies.

hehehe!


(this post is dedicated to Prof. Bing Balayon,
my good friend/mentor/mother,
perhaps the Philippine's best Reading Clinician)