Author Gina Apostol to read at UMass Amherst Visiting Writers Series

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AMHERST, Mass. – The University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers presents a reading by author Gina Apostol on Thursday, Dec. 6 at 8 p.m. in Memorial Hall.

Apostol is the author of four novels. The latest, Insurrecto, about a road trip into the heart of Duterte’s Philippines and the history of the relationship between the Philippines and the United States, was recently recognized by Publishers Weekly as a Best Book of 2018. Excerpts from Insurrecto have been anthologized as “The Unintended” in A Kind of Compass: Stories on Distance; Manila Noir; Go Home!; and The Massachusetts Review. Her third book, Gun Dealers’ Daughter, won the 2013 PEN/Open Book Award and was shortlisted for the William Saroyan International Prize. Her first two novels, Bibliolepsy and The Revolution According to Raymundo Mata, both won the Juan Laya Prize for the Novel (Philippine National Book Award).

A work-in-progress, William McKinley’s World, like Insurrecto, uses Apostol’s research on the Balangiga massacre and the Philippine-American war to cast a lens on our contemporary times. Her essays and stories have appeared in The New York Times, Los Angeles Review of Books, Foreign Policy, Gettysburg Review. She lives in New York City and western Massachusetts and grew up in Tacloban, Philippines.

Novelist Sabina Murray, who teaches in the UMass Amherst MFA program, describes Insurrecto as “another remarkable work, notable for both ferocity of intellect and provocative moral core. Insurrecto performs its singular drama across a landscape of perverse Colonialism with an unforgettable roster of characters, who act and resist within the shifting boundaries of history. Brilliant, original, and consistently funny, Insurrecto is an essential read, a book to be valued for both its entertainment and truth telling.”

Apostol is reading as part of the MFA program’s Visiting Writers Series. Celebrating its 54th year, the series at UMass Amherst presents emerging and established writers of poetry, fiction and non-fiction. The series is sponsored by the MFA for Poets and Writers and the Juniper Initiative, and made possible by support from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the University of Massachusetts Arts Council, and the English Department.

This reading is free and open to the public.