New Filipinx Literature (ft. Elaine Castillo, Luis H. Francia, Joseph O. Legaspi & Gina Apostol)

Elaine Castillo's debut novel America is Not the Heart is a vibrant and starkly hilarious novel about the De Vera family who flees Marcos-era Philippines in stages for the immigrant suburbs of the Bay Area. Elaine Castillo joins poets Luis H. Francia and Joseph O. Legaspi for a special reading about Filipinx-American history, migration, queerness, and the elusive goal of cracking the American Dream for working-class immigrants. After reading they join author Gina Apostol, author of the Gun Dealer's Daughter, for a conversation about Carlos Bulosan, Filipinx as a synthetic identity, and writing for Asian Americans vs the white establishment.