Reviews with content warning for Violence - Patron Saints of Nothing

Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay

18 reviews

cortanasreadingnook's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This heartbreaking novel of regret and guilt is an excellent introduction to Filipino authors. Jay Reguero is a seventeen-year-old senior who grew up in Detroit, Michigan. Having his life all laid out for him, everything suddenly topples over when he finds out that his cousin Jun was shot to death. So, he travels to the Philippines for spring break after 8 years to find out what happened to his cousin. He soon finds out that there are a lot more factors that played out to Jun’s untimely death.

"A universe where people do not die for doing what is right.”

Patron Saints of Nothing is painful yet genuine take on my culture, the life that I knew growing up, and is quite a reflective read, especially with the way he talks about issues that have plagued the country for decades.

As someone who has lived in the Philippines my whole life, I don’t think foreigners can even begin to understand how exhausting it is back there with the endless cycle of corruption and poverty. I appreciated how this book didn’t try to censor the realities that many Filipinos still face every day. And I am truly impressed at the amount of research that the author has done to be able to share this story with the world. This book expresses the feelings of Filipino kids who grew up to immigrant parents and has never thought about the motherland as their home and addresses detachment from one’s culture and traditions. Moreso, this was devised to make a reader uncomfortable as it discusses social issues from Jay’s perspective, one that has never lived and experienced the Philippines, making it raw, brutal, and if nothing but the truth. It is a reality check for people who think the country is a tropical paradise but is truly just showing the tip of the iceberg to its dark history with a long-battled control against the government for freedom of the press and media censorship. Many have died to gain freedom, but at what cost? The shadows of their martyrdom have loomed over the country, never to be acknowledged, never to be given justice.

Content Warnings

finnft4's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Wow, this was incredible. This book immediately grabbed my intention based on an interesting premise and a main character I could relate to. I've never really seen a protagonist so similar to me. Like Jay, I'm also half-Filipino, my mom is white, my Filipino father is moderately disconnected from his family, I feel disconnected from Filipino culture but alienated in the majority white US, and I have no idea what I'm doing with my life. A few differences, of course. A good chunk of my Filipino relatives live in Florida, and I've never been to the Philippines. Like other Americans, I'm guilty of generically seeing it as a third-world country less fortunate than my own. I'm happy to say this book changed my perspective on it.

Onto the actual novel. Randy Ribay is a master of imagery and characterizations. Everything feels so alive, from the characters to their problems to the world they live in. Even though I've never been to the Philippines, it almost felt like I visited while I read. I was able to find recognition and relate to the long parties, the food, and the confusing mess of not knowing Tagalog. There was not a single character that felt fake or two-sided, representing a simple figure to love or hate. Even ones who the main character dislikes are not simply villains. There are shades of gray. I really love how complex the characters are and how Ribay humanizes all of them.

Oh and, like Jay, I had absolutely no idea about the drug war that only recently died down in the Philippines. I was completely oblivious to anything going on, including having no idea who President Duterte was. Like the American I am, I don't know much about the affairs outside of what is immediately around me. This novel has encouraged me to work on that.

I felt like I was experiencing the story right with Jay. His reactions to grief felt so relatable and real to me. I understood his desperation, his determination, his despair. As the story continued, the cousin's death changed from a mystery into a genuine tragedy. Jun's death was always sad, but seeing the care his family had, beneath what Jay thought as apathy, was so powerful. Jun's immediate family, who both Jun and I were convinced simply did not care about his loss, had so many raw emotions right below the surface.

GOD it's devastating. I was reading the end of this in my Spanish class and had to tilt my head up to stop crying. The memorial and eulogies absolutely destroyed me. Seeing how the grief affected everyone was unbelievably powerful. Writing true, realistic grief is so difficult to accomplish without the product being trite. This is one of the most successful examples I've seen.

Patron Saints of Nothing is a beautifully multi-faceted story that I highly recommend.

Content Warnings