Out from northwestern university press/curbstone books
on may 15, 2025
As featured in
Nevada Public Radio's Desert Companion (Black Mountain Institute Conversations)
Desert Companion: "A Means for Me to Contend With Loss"
The American Writers Museum's List of Filipino-American Memoirs
Nevada Public Radio's Desert Companion (Black Mountain Institute Conversations)
Desert Companion: "A Means for Me to Contend With Loss"
The American Writers Museum's List of Filipino-American Memoirs
For more information about the book, here is a downloadable Press Kit!
For my book tour dates, click here!
Want to support my book? Pre-order it from Northwestern University Press!
Or Pre-order a SIGNED, PERSONALIZED copy from Bel Canto Books in Long Beach!
Or get it from Bookshop, Barnes & Noble, Thriftbooks, Indigo Chapters (Canada), The Women's Bookshop, Time Out Bookstore or Unity Books (Aotearoa New Zealand), or...
Pre-order it from your local independent bookstore! Some bookstores I'd like to support (that are also supporting this book by hosting my events) are The Writer's Block in Las Vegas, Book People in Austin, and Brazos Bookstore in Houston.
Are you a teacher who'd like to consider my book for course adoption, or a reviewer interested in spreading the word about my book? Click here to request for an Exam, Desk, or Review copy.
For my book tour dates, click here!
Want to support my book? Pre-order it from Northwestern University Press!
Or Pre-order a SIGNED, PERSONALIZED copy from Bel Canto Books in Long Beach!
Or get it from Bookshop, Barnes & Noble, Thriftbooks, Indigo Chapters (Canada), The Women's Bookshop, Time Out Bookstore or Unity Books (Aotearoa New Zealand), or...
Pre-order it from your local independent bookstore! Some bookstores I'd like to support (that are also supporting this book by hosting my events) are The Writer's Block in Las Vegas, Book People in Austin, and Brazos Bookstore in Houston.
Are you a teacher who'd like to consider my book for course adoption, or a reviewer interested in spreading the word about my book? Click here to request for an Exam, Desk, or Review copy.
A young Filipino writer’s odyssey toward home, in the wake of the loss of her poet father
Feeling untethered after her beloved poet father passes away while she is living abroad, Monica Macansantos decides to return to the Philippines to regain her bearings. But with her father gone and her adult life rooted in the United States and New Zealand, can the land of her birth still serve as a place of healing?
In fifteen richly felt essays, Macansantos considers her family’s history in the Philippines, her own experiences as an exile, and the parent who was the heart of her family’s kitchen, whether standing at the stove to prepare dinner or sitting at the table to scribble in his notebook. Macansantos finds herself remaking her father’s chicken adobo, but also closely rereading his poems. As she reckons with his identity as an artist, she also comes into her own as a writer, and she invites us to consider whether it is possible to carry our homes with us wherever we go.
Advance Praise
“Returning to My Father’s Kitchen is about what is left behind—the ghosts, apparitions, and hauntings of people. This book is bold and sharply observed, giving voice to those lost in the margins of literature. Intimate and candid, any reader would feel solace in Macansantos’s company.” --Grace Talusan, author of The Body Papers: A Memoir
“A book about getting knocked around and the supernatural strength it takes to get back up again. A portrait of the artist as sous chef to a dearly departed dad, tango-dancing necromancer, and—most deliciously—world-class literary bruiser. Sudden and mysterious as a perfectly executed recipe, or grief itself. Unmistakably magical.” --Greg Marshall, author of Leg
Feeling untethered after her beloved poet father passes away while she is living abroad, Monica Macansantos decides to return to the Philippines to regain her bearings. But with her father gone and her adult life rooted in the United States and New Zealand, can the land of her birth still serve as a place of healing?
In fifteen richly felt essays, Macansantos considers her family’s history in the Philippines, her own experiences as an exile, and the parent who was the heart of her family’s kitchen, whether standing at the stove to prepare dinner or sitting at the table to scribble in his notebook. Macansantos finds herself remaking her father’s chicken adobo, but also closely rereading his poems. As she reckons with his identity as an artist, she also comes into her own as a writer, and she invites us to consider whether it is possible to carry our homes with us wherever we go.
Advance Praise
“Returning to My Father’s Kitchen is about what is left behind—the ghosts, apparitions, and hauntings of people. This book is bold and sharply observed, giving voice to those lost in the margins of literature. Intimate and candid, any reader would feel solace in Macansantos’s company.” --Grace Talusan, author of The Body Papers: A Memoir
“A book about getting knocked around and the supernatural strength it takes to get back up again. A portrait of the artist as sous chef to a dearly departed dad, tango-dancing necromancer, and—most deliciously—world-class literary bruiser. Sudden and mysterious as a perfectly executed recipe, or grief itself. Unmistakably magical.” --Greg Marshall, author of Leg
Essays from this collection have appeared, in slightly different form, in Colorado Review, Lunch Ticket, The Hopkins Review, Bennington Review, and About Place Journal, among others, and have been recognized as Notable in the Best American Essays 2023, 2022, 2021, and 2016. The author would like to thank the editors of journals who published essays in this collection for amplifying her work.