Instead of clothing, food, gadgets or money, books are the perfect holiday gifts. Not only do they last, one gains and gets much when you buy for yourself or become a receiver of one.
It expands your vocabulary, for starters. When I encounter a new word from a novel or autobiography, searching for its meaning in a dictionary, (never the thesaurus, mind you) has been a habit hard to break. Looking for its definition in a dictionary strikes a major difference because it teaches you how you can use the given word as a noun, adjective or verb. And yes, immediately, using this new word in a sentence follows suit.
More good reasons, it transports you to another place and time. Allows you to imagine and behold the written word. It gives you insights on a particular belief system, failures, struggles, triumphs and culture of the authors who wrote them.
And most of all, it broadens your enlightenment and understanding of your fellow human being. It makes you realize that we are all truly complicated creatures, governed by our minds, loins, and most of our hearts, and how we strike a balance and deal with these forces, make our lives not only in a surviving mode but living in the truest essence of the word.
Allow me to share my top picks, books that resonated to me the most, and re-read from time to time, and hopefully, you make think of them as gifts: Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, Emily Bronte’s Wuthering and Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ Dangerous Liaisons, think epic and intrigue, mayhem and passionate love in all its splendor, these novels nailed it.
Sensuality, sexual beings that succumb to the flesh, all sorts of seduction and magical realism elements that are ever present in Laura Esquivel’s Like Water For Chocolate, Isabel Allende’s Of Love and Shadows, Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s 100 Years of Solitude and Love In the Time of Cholera.
If you are on the lookout for a book by a Filipino author, go to the nearest bookstore and look for Nanay’s Gay Boy, by King of Talk Boy Abunda.
“Speak your truth,” he writes a short but impactful dedication on my book copy.
His book contains two emotional and stirring speeches, Why Can’t We Have A Gay President and Dearest Nanay.
Why Can’t We Have A Gay President is a question that provokes us all. How come we don’t have one? Is there no man or woman whose sexual orientation and preference who are not the same as the status quo courageous enough to take the bold and brave step of becoming the first Philippine gay president? Is the present scenario ripe for a gay or lesbian leader for this Republic or it is still too premature to even think of it as a possibility?
Dearest Nanay, on the other hand, is love letter and tribute made into a speech for his Nanay Lesing. In this part of the book, one gets to read the devotion, dedication, and love of Abunda for his nanay dearest who is a heroine, a symbol of hope, a source of inspiration and his greatest critic and friend.
Boy’s book will definitely stir a lot of sensibilities, proof which are some lines quoted from it, “This is the best time for exploration. This is the best time for discovery, observation, and provocation. This is also the best time to challenge prejudicial, discriminatory and common cultural beliefs. This is also the best time to correct the wrongdoings of colonialism.”
Nanay’s Gay Boy is now available in leading bookstores.