Yñiga
Ateneo de Manila University Press
264 pages, paperback
2022
International editions: Coffee House Press (US), Pink Shorts Press (Australia and New Zealand), Tilted Axis Press (UK)
Winner, Philippine National Book Award
Shortlisted for the 2020 Novel Prize
Cover art by Jo Tanierla
Yñiga Calinauan’s quiet life is upended when a retired army general wanted for the murder of peasants and activists in the countryside is captured across the street from her house. Days later the neighborhood is burned to the ground in what some say is retaliation. With nowhere to go, she returns to M—, the small fishing town where she grew up and now hopes to regain the quiet life she has lost. But soon she discovers that the terror she thought she had escaped in the city is right on her trail, and she must face the “forest of history” that has long haunted her family.
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“Diaz, like all great novelists of history, knows that to disappear—and to be disappeared—is a political question as much as an existential one. This moving, remarkable novel—as dense, meditative and engrossing as the forests its characters are haunted by, and as dryly funny as the jokes we tell ourselves to survive—is as much a visceral, unforgettable journey into one woman’s fraught familial legacy of disappearance and resistance, as well as a deeply poignant meditation on nation-building itself—and its own fraught familial legacy of disappearance, and resistance.”
Elaine Castillo
“With lyrical yet profound narration, with characters who sometimes bear the weight of history, and with rare sensitivity, Diaz pulls us into a narrative current that appears calm on the surface but conceals dangerous whirlpools beneath.”
Eka Kurniawan
“Diaz skillfully explores the history of terror and upheaval in the Philippines after the Cold War.”
Publishers Weekly
“I am taken aback at the force of Yñiga. I have focused on its political aspects, but its artistry is in its composition. Rarely is this kind of disjointed technique deployed to meaningful effect in contemporary literature, where it often reads as an unnecessary reaching for some kind of artificial cultural value. In Yñiga, Diaz gives readers a glimpse into his country’s history in the only way that would do it justice.”
The Conversation
Yñiga is intricate and tightly wound. Diaz does not indulge in hand-holding exposition; he throws you into the brambles of his nation’s history … the element of uncertainty is why Yñiga rewards the attention it demands.”
Australian Review of Books
“Glenn Diaz sees corruption and its paradoxes embedded in a cultural dynamic perpetually at play between power and survival. With great depth of vision and masterful prose, he puts us in touch not only with imported violence but with a local resistance heroically determined to better its condition.”
Brian Castro
“Diaz’s fierce and articulate intellect dazzles in his very evocative and at times funny but most deadpan and wry prose. He has captured the often absurd and peculiar life in the Philippines with a fond but critical eye.”
Asian Review of Books
“As one of the country’s most engaging and versatile storytellers, Diaz amazes as no other can. Between the interlocking scenes of beauty and horror runs a magic that only Diaz can create out of thin air, subtle in some places, maniacal in others, yet every so mindful that the author must be in full control of the story. The way the author grabs hold of the political question and allow it to rankle and grow bitter slowly in the heart of the reader is a marvel of political storytelling.”
Citation for the Philippine National Book Award