"PALILAN RIVER (A NOVEL) revised edition is published by Book of Life in Las *Pinas City, Metro Manila. (*pronounced 'pinyas')
CEBU CITY, PHILIPPINES (November 19, 2019) --- A book on "Palilan River" of the heritage town of Jimenez in Misamis Occidental is already on its first revision and distribution after its release in August 2019 under Book of Life publishing house in Las Pinas City, Metropolitan Manila.
The book, self-published by author Rommel Mark Dominguez Marchan, took off press in August and revised in November. The first revised edition sells at P430 a copy. Orders may be placed through the official Facebook page of the author bearing the same complete name. Other inquiries may be done through his Messenger account.
JANSKIE MAGBANUA LIBRE of San Carlos City, Negros Occidental brings the book home to join the Pintaflores Festival marked every end of October. Janskie supports #localauthors and #everythingPinoy.
SYNOPSIS. Memories in early childhood are first instances in life. Your home. Your niche. The pulsating natural world. The convulsions of the cosmic world. These are all tied up to a world left behind.
One's journey out of the confines of home is likened to a river, meandering - always creating a path to meet out bigger, wider, deeper space. Join the author in unraveling pieces of himself as he went through tight process of learning & unlearning, putting the Palilan River as a backdrop & logical fallacy as a centerpiece as he flowed with the currents of change, immersed in the diurnal motion of the waters' surging in & raging out to meet the ocean.
Then, on to the strongest desire of his heart: to make himself an author which anchors on a lifetime of book-loving, a craft punishing as words become elusive at times. Or vague even at the highs of surplus.
Then, on to the strongest desire of his heart: to make himself an author which anchors on a lifetime of book-loving, a craft punishing as words become elusive at times. Or vague even at the highs of surplus.
Writing is onerous. Childhood memories manifest like hiccups even in middle age. The river stays true to its essence through centuries. These elements are woven painstakingly in a backstory that underscores one can only understand his past better if he could find it right at the point where he started & knew only of it for the very first time!
The author who spent a decade in Dubai as an overseas Filipino worker has always been passionate about books. In grade school, he spent hours with books of a variety of genre. The attachment compels him to produce his own books using his first-hand account of childhood in the provinces of Lanao del Norte and Misamis Occidental. The narrative encapsulates his admiration for the calm and quiet, as well as the turbulence and rage of "Palilan River" - a natural heritage. The river as a backdrop to his account of growing-up years and discovery of the joy of travel and small wonders served as a strong metaphor to a decisive character which flows against and around boulders. This is pretty symbolic of the challenges one encounters in a life-long battle in winning over adversaries and adversities.
He feels unwittingly "nothing at first glance, but a force to reckon with as he affects lives and limbs" tumbling and traveling like a river - in ways placid but in other times feisty.
In the first chapter of "Palilan River," he mentioned of Jimenez as a heritage town as declared by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts in coordination with the National Historical Commission. There is the mention of the Saint John the Baptist Church as a UNESCO heritage site. There are other important sites like the imposing presence of a kamil tree (a family of the acacia tree) which has become a centerpiece for folk tales and mythical creatures, as well as incidents of incantation like a courier's delivery of Sleeprite beds to an address specific to where the kamil tree stands.
DENNIS IAN LARGO TANOC, Broadcast Communication instructor of Cebu Normal University, former Banat News copy editor & TV5-Cebu news anchor, and now a teacher in Valencia, Spain supports "Palilan River."
But above all, the thread of childhood fond memories and the thread of adulation for poetry weave skillfully to reveal an impressive tapestry of historical fiction with the undertones of creative fallacy. With the use of images present in his current workplace in Dubai such as the Shangri-La and the Burj Khalifa, he incorporated these to the story to stand for a ship cruising come hell or high waters. It simply brings him to face his own turmoil and inner swollen seas. Burj Khalifa - acclaimed for being once the highest building in the world - is his biggest achievement, so to say. The towering structure became literally a part of him as an "accolade for working with top honchos in the restaurateur sector of the United Arab Emirates."
This means that because of his connections with multinationals, he was able to meet friends who entrust him a space in Burj Khalifa where he wrote and rewrote most of the remaining chapters and fillers to this novel. The author works for the operations of 35 branches of Chinese Palace Restaurant Group with over a thousand personnel to care for and a throng of guests to attend to. These are Din Tai Fung - Dubai, Han Shi Fu, Bado Chinese, Panda Chinese, Umami, Koryo, to name some.
JEAN FIGUEROA BENDITA, former public school teacher & currently clerk III of Municipal Trial Court in Cities Branch 3, Lapu-Lapu City reads "Palilan River."
He shares in this book that you can start as a nobody - collide head on with fear - and work from there to arrive somewhere giving up some of your dreams, chasing some, and arriving at your destination, finding what really makes you happy. And in this case, it's book writing.
He has been keen about producing five books in the next months with "Geography of My Life" to boot a privilege the Chinese Palace Restaurant Group of Companies has given him. He started talking here of his flights, his encounter with diverse culture in first-world Dubai, the home and family he has to leave behind, including his innate desire to take up Law, his inner angels and demons, his vices and virtues.
As his editor it was a battle to put tons of rambling, babbling information in a coherent, comprehensible form. It closely sounded the babbling of brooks and streams that you have to attentively listen to to be able to transcribe every train of thought in order, in precision, in context, in the shape of a literary piece.
The book has to eloquently retell the story of a boy who just loved books. Who would want to see his own book. I mean books. It was a struggle to put the thread of continuity in place knowing that the author is not a writer. But one who is a bibliophile all his life. He knows the rigors of writing, he understands the pains of giving birth to a book. He respects most authors he had encountered and understands how respect is tied up to all who have produced the same. Thus, he established the strongest statement of his life: Palilan River: A Novel distributed by RMD Books Trading.
In a way, I have also fulfilled my calling as his editor. Not just for creative journalism, but for fiction as well. This is a 22-year-old project. A simple story made lovelier by Palilan River. I have imbibed the wisdom of most successful authors: to never depart from everything familiar.
You can only write skillfully about the things you knew so well!
You should care about this project being of a Filipino author, and a Bisaya at that. It may not manifest in between the lines all the time but the author is battling emotional torture while undertaking this pursuit because he acknowledges HE IS NOT A WRITER. He just worships the wordy world. With that, the hashtag of his life is to LEAVE A MARK, true to his second name.
As for the imperfections of the book these should not outplay the charm of the characters, Jet and Melchor. The two are both witty and fun to be with as they rowed a small boat down to the "bukana" or mouth of the river learning from each other.
The book travels too through the hand of a buyer. This is his other goal. That every buyer/reader would be able to take a picture of the book wherever it is being taken. A snap of the book before an important tourist spot or heritage site signifies the book traveling like a river, traveling like the author. The photos will morph into a collage which will be the subject of another book.##
The original copies. Around 50 were sold to friends and acquaintances in Singapore, Dubai, New York City, Misamis Occidental, Metro Manila, Cebu Province, Leyte, Zambales, among others.
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