Although they’ve lost touch, as Jay owed his cousin letters, the rest of his family is silent and guarded. While Jay struggles with feelings of guilt, he’s also dismayed by the silence around his cousin’s death. He has a place at university and feels as though he’s drifting until he’s awakened on a Saturday morning with chilling news. (Little Tiger Press) Patron Saints of Nothing opens as Jay is close to spring break. Bookwagon is proud to recommend this outstanding book to our older, teenage readers. It contemplates truth, consequence, belonging and purpose so thoughtfully and empathetically. Patron Saints of Nothing is a phenomenal YA novel. His Philippine relatives consider him truly American. Yet what happens when there is a silence, that every sense of Jun has been eradicated- it’s like Jun never existed! Can Jay unpick the threads of his cousin’s life, disappearance and eventual death to discover the young man with such a life to live, seemingly? Thereafter, what is the truth about the Philippines? Could it be as Tito Maning describes, that Philippines is an inspiration where ‘ people are held accountable for their actions’? Or could it be as Jun, and then Mia and Grace, describe and experience? Additionally, who is Jay? Is he Filipino, or American? He has shoes in both courts, and feels American, with memories only of the Philippines.

Such is Jay’s need to find the truth that he travels to Manila to stay with his uncles and aunts. Jun was always there, the cousin who showed compassion, whose letters spoke of his inner turmoil at the injustice he saw in the world, and his plans for the future.

However when his father tells Jay that Jun is dead, he’s knocked sideways. Yet life keeps happening and now there’s Spring Break and a place at the University of Michigan awaiting. They wanted the audience to confront the reality, to feel the pain that’s been numbed by a headline culture.Jay meant to write to his cousin Jun in the Philippines. These photographers didn’t want to water it down. In high definition, I see the victims’ wounds, their oddly twisted limbs, their blood and brain matter sprayed across familiar-looking streets. There’s even a short video of grainy security cam footage in which a masked motorcyclist pulls up next to a man in an alleyway, shoots him point-blank in the side of the head, then drives away. Grayish-green corpses stacked like firewood in an improvised morgue.

A body with its head covered in a dirty cloth left in a pile of garbage on the side of the street. Sisters gathered around their baby brother’s body lying in its small casket. A couple, half on the ground and half tangled in their moped, their blank faces turned toward the camera and sprays of blood on the pavement behind their heads. A crowd looking on, emotionless, as police shine a flashlight on a woman’s bloodied corpse. A woman cradling her husband’s limp body. “It’s the photos that hit me the hardest, though.

Patron saints of nothing book cover