The Solemn Lantern Maker

by Bobis, Merlinda

• ISBN13: 9780385341134
• ISBN10: 038534113X
• Edition: Original
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2009-10-27
• Publisher: Delta

Summary

From the award-winning author of "Banana Heart Summer" comes a wondrous tale of hope, secrets, and family devotion in a season of miracles.

Author Biography

Merlinda Bobis has received numerous awards, prizes and fellowships for her fiction, poetry and plays, among them the Prix Italia for Rita’s Lullaby, the Steel Rudd Award for the Best Published Collection of Australian Short Stories, the Judges’ Choice Award (Bumbershoot Bookfair, Seattle Arts Festival) and the Philippine National Book Award for White Turtle, or The Kissing, and the Philippine Balagtas Award, a lifetime achievement award for her fiction and poetry in English, Pilipino and Bicol. Her plays have been performed in Australia, the Philippines, France, China, Thailand and the Slovak Republic. Banana Heart Summer is her first novel; its Australian edition was short-listed for the Australian Literary Society Gold Medal. Her second novel, The Solemn Lantern Maker, will be released in the U.S. in 2009. As a performer for stage and radio, Merlinda works with artists from various genres. She lives in Australia where she teaches creative writing.

Excerpts

Chapter One
 
A star has five lights. Noland thinks it so it must be true. Angels live in stars, with fire in their chests. So when they breathe, the sky twinkles. Noland thinks hard what he can't say as he runs from car to car, peddling his own version of stars. Around him, the festive business rises to fever pitch—"Only six days to Christmas, ma'am, sir, so you're getting these cheap. You can't miss out, only six days."
 
How dare anyone miss out? At this intersection of the highway, star lanterns made of translucent capiz shells outshine each other, desperate to be sold. Red, green, gold, and pearly white blink and whirl with electric lights, like stained glass on speed. The shoppers' faces catch the glow. So does Noland's. It is a solemn face, like those of plaster saints who endure years of silent watching.
 
"Hoy, you're blocking my customers!" a stall owner scolds the boy, who steadies his wooden cart of lanterns. His are made of Japanese paper, small stars with two frilly tails instead of lights. "Are you serious?" one shopper asks, looking incredulously from the boy's simple wares to the giant creation she bought for six thousand pesos. Heaven should be grand, boy, and bringing it down to earth is costly business. "Hoy, over here!" a man calls out from an old Mitsubishi. Finally, a customer. "How much?" he asks, while peeling a pork bun.
 
Noland raises five fingers thrice to indicate fifteen pesos.
 
Intent on his dinner, the man does not see the price. "How much?" he asks again. Noland raises his palm close to the man's face, repeating the gesture.
 
The man pauses, stares—
 
Palm as small as a star, star as small as a country.
 
Now where did that come from? He's becoming a poet.
 
Steam rises from the bun. Noland imagines the pork stew and the salted egg inside. He hands the man a red star, eyes on the first bite. Is the yolk bigger than the white? The man pays with a fifty-peso bill. Noland shakes his head and shows an empty palm. No change, sorry sir. Perhaps two more stars? He offers a green one this time and another red.
 
"No, keep the change." He waves the boy away and hangs the star on his window, just above the wheel. Then as an afterthought, "You mute, kid?"
 
The ten-year-old nods.
 
The man sighs, taking in the face that is too gaunt, too serious for a child.
 
My country's children small as hope.


Chapter Two
 
"Of course yours are the real thing, because you make them in the old style," his friend Elvis assures him. "Small stars but specially homemade by the master star maker, so gimme five!" Then the customary palm-slapping before turning his baseball cap at a jaunty angle and running toward the traffic.
 
Noland wonders about his friend's exceptional gift. He's chatting up a Pajero now. Earlier it was a Mercedes. They met only a month ago but Elvis has quickly made himself indispensable as Noland's "parol assistant," churning out most of the sales. His uncle Bobby Cool, with his Walkman, cell phone, and gold crucifix, has become their "parol godfather."
 
Parol is the traditional star lantern. Not for Noland, though. You call a star a star, or not at all. But of course, he can't say. Nor can he say that Bobby's donation of five hundred pesos toward his business is too generous. What if he can't sell enough lanterns to pay him back? But uncle and nephew assured him that business would grow if they worked together like family. Noland grew warm inside when he heard it. Like family. Like Christmas gift-wrapped in kind voices. They grew softer when his benefactors realized he couldn't speak. "You don't say because you're busy thinking," Elvis diagnosed his condition. "So gimme five!" Their friendship was sealed.
 
"Buy ah-one, ah-two, ah-homemade-star, ah-three, ah-four, ah-homemade-st

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Excerpted from The Solemn Lantern Maker by Merlinda Bobis
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.