Reuniting with Strangers is a kaleidoscopic debut novel-in-stories that maps the separations and reconnections of diasporic Filipino families whose stories intersect with the journey of an enigmatic five-year-old named Monolith.
Vera has been dreaming for years about the day she will be reunited with her son Monolith, who has been raised by her sister in the Philippines ever since Vera moved overseas to work as a caregiver. But when he finally arrives, Monolith is violent, destructive, and unable—or unwilling?—to speak.
Monolith and Vera weave themselves through the chapters that follow, as new characters take up the narrative, telling their own stories and providing insight into Monolith’s psyche. Incorporating a plethora of forms—emails, text messages, resumes, a songbook, an instruction manual—and traversing diverse settings scattered across Canada and the Philippines, their voices combine to form a joyful, devastating, humorous, and surprising account of the way North American reliance on Filipina caregivers has impacted families on both sides of the ocean.
Compellingly readable, Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio’s stunning debut reveals the displacement, estrangement, resilience and healing in the homes and hearts of the Filipino community around the globe.
"Inspired by the work of Souvankham Thammavongsa, Catherine Hernandez and Wayson Choy, this unforgettable novel follows the reunification of Filipino caregiver families over one Canadian winter--and the mysterious progress of Monolith, who appears and disappears in their lives. When five-year-old Monolith is taken from the Philippines to live with his mother in Canada, he immediately lashes out. Unable or unwilling to speak, he attacks her and destroys his new home. Everyone wants to know why--and everyone has a theory. But unlike the solid certainty his name suggests, the answer isn't so simple. From a cliffside town in the Tagaytay highlands of the Philippines, to the Filipino communities in the desert of Osoyoos, the Arctic world of Iqaluit, the suburbs of southern Ontario, Sarnia's Chemical Valley, Montéral's ôCte-des-Neiges, and Toronto's Little Manila, Austria-Bonifacio takes readers into the kaleidoscope of the Filipino diaspora, uncovering the displacement, estrangement, resilience and healing that happen behind closed doors. As each chapter unfolds, truths are revealed in humorous, joyful, devastating and surprising ways: through an incisive caregiver's instruction manual, a custody battle over texts and e-mails, a disarmingly direct self-help guide, a series of desperate érsuéms, a kundiman songbook, and more. Monolith appears again and again, as a misbehaving boy in a store, the subject of town gossip, a face in a fundraising campaign, a client in questionable care, a dying man's beacon of hope--and an unlikely new friend. Compellingly readable, incisive and resonant, Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio's stunning debut opens a window into the homes and hearts of the Filipino-Canadian community."--
