E.P. Tuazon’s Story Collection Turns the Ordinary into Surreal

Book Review: A Professional Lola and Other Stories by E.P. Tuazon, published by Red Hen Press, 208 pages

Ian McEwan wrote in Atonement that “in a story, you only had to wish, you only had to write it down and could have the world.” The quote couldn’t be more true than in the case of E.P. Tuazon’s story collection. Tuazon turns even the most ordinary scenario into something surreal, if not magical.

In the titular story, a five-year-old boy’s birthday party brings 30 of the child’s family members together. Nothing unusual about that, except the family hires a professional lola, a woman who plays the role of Lola Basilia, the narrator’s deceased grandmother. A little eccentric? Perhaps, except the actress turns out to be a dead ringer for Basilia. She speaks and behaves like Basilia, even dislikes cigarette smell like the real lola. She’s so good that the narrator’s Uncle Bong cries at the sight of the woman.  

In another story, a newly married couple wake up in the wee hours craving pandesal (Filipino bread roll), which is typically eaten for breakfast in the Philippines. In another writer’s hands, the premise would probably lead to something mundane, like the couple baking their own bread. In Tuazon’s story, the couple rob a panaderya, the bakery where sweet-smelling, freshly baked pandesal abound. They arrive complete with rifles and ski masks. The story leaves me feeling as though I’m floating in the foggy realm between sleep and wakefulness.

The collection explores a wide range of subjects, from Filipino witches to a grandfather transitioning into a woman to Bigfoot lounging on the beach in the Philippines. What makes this book special is the author’s fresh, strange, and unique style of telling stories about the Filipino diaspora.

Learn more about E.P. Tuazon and A Professional Lola and Other Stories