WRITER. JOURNALIST. EDITOR.
JOEL PABLO SALUD
R E V I E W S
Salud’s writing is powerful and authoritative without being condescending nor pushy. It lays details one after the other in uncompromising fashion followed by insightful analysis that presents his point of view on the topic while allowing the reader latitude to explore her or his own.
By K.D. Absolutely
One of the best collection of short stories that I read in the recent past. My first time to read a book of newspaperman Joel Pablo Salud and I am definitely impressed.I got this book from the launching of Rio Alma's Ang Romansa ng Pagsagip ng Osong Marso (4 stars) last year and it was given to me for free by the author with the promise that I would review this here in Goodreads.
However, I am not rating this with 4 stars because of that. This book definitely deserves all those stars. In fact, I almost rated this with full five stars if not for some of the 10 stories that I found wanting.
The best story in this collection of me is the first one, The Distance of Rhymes as it feels like reading about Vladimir Nabokov's characters in Lolita (5 stars) but with the skillful storytelling of Gabriel Garcia Marquez what with the names of the characters sounding like those of Latin Americans'.
It tells the story of an old professor who falls in love with his student and they have an age difference of 35 years. The plot seemed implausible at first but if you dig deeper into the reasons why it happened, if you become more emphatic towards them, then you would see the possibility. It is poignant, bittersweet and in the end, I would say (view spoiler) but nevertheless engaging.
At Midnight's End is the longest story in this collection. It tells the story of a hired assassin. It is not your typical story of how an poor man is pushed to the limit so he ends up as a hired killer. Salud makes the character more humane and the reader could actually symphatize to how a decent man could turn against society if there was no hope left for him.
Beethoven's Child is, for me, the most mysterious and it actually verges on being paranormal. It tells the story of a fatherless child who is being taken cared of by his artist-uncle during daytime when his mother is at work. The child is deaf but he can play the piano like Beethoven. I do not want to spoil your fun but if you see this book in a bookstore and the book is open for a few minutes of reading, go for this short story as you can finish this while standing up so you don't need to pay for the book. Just sample Salud and I bet that you will like this if you are a paranormal fan and you will, for sure, end up buying the book.
Goodnight, Irene is the saddest among the 10 stories. It tells the story of a lunatic and paranoid father who decides to keep his only child, a daughter, in the attic so she will not be seen and won't be taken away by anybody. (view spoiler)
Insurrecto's tight weaving of story is a joy to analyze. The ending surprised me. I did not see it coming. I thought that the epistolary format is just plain outpouring of the father's emotion as he recalls their family history. But as he goes on and on, the plot thickens, one can appreciate Salud's gift as an astute storyteller.
The other works are good but they reminded me of other works of literature or movies. For example, the gullibility and superstitions of the town in Godsend is akin to Ricky Lee's opus Himala while the Season of Green Roses reminded me of Disney's Beauty and the Beast. So, those movies spoiled the impact of the stories for me.
The four others did not leave any imprint on my brain. I don't remember them at all. Or maybe I was just distracted by the noise last night when I was waiting for 2014. So, I need to reread them. Maybe. Maybe not.
Thank you, Mr. Joel Pablo Salud for giving me a copy of this book. I am looking forward to reading your other books. I promise that next time, I will buy your book already. :)
Review of Blood Republic by Jenny Ortuoste
Manila Standard Today
The cover is red as blood, the title catchy as a suspense movie’s.
Philippines Graphic magazine’s editor-in-chief Joel Pablo Salud’s latest book, Blood Republic, is a collection of non-fiction essays, “random recollections of writings about persons and events, thoughts and ideas,” says the author, that he feels “have played an intriguing role in my view of the world as a writer.”
He quotes University of the Philippines Professor Emeritus Gemino Abad as saying, “As writers, we are only as strong as our memory.” Though Salud says Blood Republic “can hardly be called a memoir,” it serves the purpose of an aide memoire of events in the life of a man and in the timeline of society.
There are fascinating essays about Frank Sionil Jose “(Huks, Lines, and Frankie”), Nick Joaquin (“Onching’s Manila”), for these two alone the book is worth the price of admission. There are pieces on topics as diverse as Martial Law, Jesus, Filipino Muslims, despots now and then, poetry, and monsoons, the latter piece adorned with a digression into the influence of Playboy magazine on a young boy’s psyche; now ‘fess up, haven’t we all been there?
Salud’s writing is powerful and authoritative without being condescending nor pushy. It lays details one after the other in uncompromising fashion followed by insightful analysis that presents his point of view on the topic while allowing the reader latitude to explore her or his own.
The interesting stuff is personal. “Saddam under my roof,” about his father Oscar, presents a remarkable man who quoted Kierkegaard and Locke, worked in San Francisco and Alaska, put up a workers union and ran afoul of the mob, and shot a traitor.
“He was too busy being himself,” Salud says of his father, who, however, was not too busy to tell his son: “Anak, fight for the freedom of your pen, look after the poor, and never fear to enter hell, even with just a spoonful of water.”
Salud is honest to the point of pain: in self-deprecation he points to himself as being “a…snooty boy overburdened by dreams,” a “garden-variety recluse” writing “poor excuses for poetry to break the monotony” of his younger years.
The raw sincerity in his essays touches that same chord within us that reminds us of our own youth, perhaps misspent but certainly a learning experience, and the travails and triumphs along the path that led to our current condition.
Whether we have become wiser or not for the journey is, for Salud, immaterial to having lived the life. In Blood Republic, he says, the reader will find “lives, loves, losses, and laurels” from the perspective of one who’s been there, done all that. For all the worldly insight, there is no sense of jadedness here, no cynicism, only a wide-eyed wonder at what has been and is still to come.
The book is initially available at the Philippines Graphic office on Pasong Tamo Avenue, Makati City.
Joel Pablo Salud's book, The Distance of Rhymes and Other Tragedies briefly noted by Philippines' National Artist for Literature F. Sionil Jose in his column "Hindsight" in the Philippine Star (Feb. 3, 2014)
"Joel Pablo Salud, editor of the weekly Graphic, not only edits the magazine and writes those weekly articles — he has squeezed time to write these well-crafted stories that resonate because they are so thoroughly contextual, they depict and probe deep into contemporary life.
"Joel did something unnecessary, though. In his introduction, he gives the background of how each story was conceived. A story should stand by itself — and these stories do — without the props.
"My favorite in this collection is 'Insurrecto.' Every Filipino should read it because it is history made alive only because Joel is brilliant; he is also committed to the truth.
"I hope that he can yet steal more time from a very exacting job to do a novel.
This old editor’s only advice to Joel: beware of adjectives."
UNO Magazine
"If there is one thing The Distance of Rhymes and Other Tragedies has proven, it is that Joel Pablo Salud, its author and badass Editor-in-Chief of the country's only newsweekly magazine, is a sappy romantic at heart. While The Distance of Rhymes and Other Tragedies is a spectrum away from love stories, it takes a romantic, and a hopeless one at that, to write fiction about love and its myriad ways of expression. Salud's collection of short stories reads like "old leather"--romantic, elegant, with a mustiness that makes readers nostalgic of lives lived long ago, if at all."
Alma Anonas-Carpio reviews Joel Pablo Salud's collection of short fiction, "The Distance of Rhymes and Other Tragedies."
There is a lyricism to Salud's stories that transcends words and imagery. These stories are fearlessly torn from a beating heart and presented without diffusion of the pain or the joy of his characters.
The stories are full in their telling--as are the plot, characterization and construction. This is art concealing art, baring unvarnished truths as only the best fiction can. Yet the storyteller makes beauty of things that others would see as broken or lacking.
It is the imperfection of the characters, set against the sepia tint photo quality of the plots and tale progression that make these stories such a lovely read.Put it down if you can, once you open the pages. Mesmeric prose at its very best. Trust me when I tell you that you will drink deep of Salud's worlds and you will wish the stories had no end.
Alma Anonas-Carpio reviews BLOOD REPUBLIC:
"Where essays are rarely seen as passionate, Salud breaks the mold: The fire in his words is banked only by the discipline of his daily work as journalist, editor and writer of stories.
This is the work of a Filipino whose blood carries the passion of revolution, the intensity of a Katipunero on the field of battle, and melds these with the keen attention to detail of a consummate battle strategist.
In between the works of fire and brimstone, Salud also waxes melodic and lyrical, his words carrying that song of the soul that is also very much in the blood of every Filipino. Read Blood Republic and you will have an inkling of who and what a Filipino is, what fire it is that burns so brightly in the darkness and confusion of a nation that has yet to come into its own.
Some people would call me partisan, for I have edited Salud's essays, because I call him brother and friend, because he is my boss. Let me answer such critics with these words: I would not read nor edit anyone not worth my time, for I, too, am a writer with my own works on the front burner. I only call friend and sibling those I deem worth that time away from my own writing. Salud is, definitely, worth more than that.
If I loved Salud's first publication outing in his book of short stories titled "The Distance of Rhymes and Other Tragedies (UST Press, 2012), I absolutely adore "Blood Republic." Because it calls to my blood. Because it understands me. Because it is beautiful in a way most essay-writing is not.
This tome speaks with the old-world refinement that makes of the essay a beautiful thing and Salud shows how it is done right."