11 Must-Read Filipino Sci-Fi Books
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Loading... - Chaves Althea
- 15 Mar 2023
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Philippine literature is slowly gaining international recognition, especially when it comes to general fiction and fantasy. And there are even more sub-genres waiting to be explored by international readers. For instance, though there’s a dearth of Filipino sci-fi books, they are so rare and precious that it’s only once in a while when they come out. In fact, you can count them on one hand.
“Fantasy is more popular in the Philippines given our rich heritage of folklore and mythology. Science fiction on the other hand, suffers from the difficulty of achieving suspension of disbelief in the readers. The Philippines is generally still not perceived as a technologically innovative society despite the scientific and technological achievements of our scientists and engineers,” Emil Francis Flores, professor at the Department of English and Comparative Literature at the University of the Philippines Diliman, told me. Flores is also one of the editors of the Filipino science fiction collection Diaspora Ad Astra: An Anthology of Science Fiction from the Philippines, which we will go over later. According to him, Filipinos are also “users of technology but the technology is mostly perceived to be foreign,” and he hoped that this perception will change.
Although there’s an apparent short supply of Filipino science fiction books in circulation, I’ve managed to find 11 of them.
Just a quick note for everyone: Philippine literature has more speculative fiction that incorporates sci-fi, so you’ll mostly find “science-sy” spec fic books in this list. And though that’s the case, there are also books that perfectly fall under the sci-fi genre. Finally, this list also features both Filipino authors from the Philippines as well as those from its diaspora.
THE BEST FILIPINO SCI-FI BOOKS
SCIENCE FICTION: FILIPINO FICTION FOR YOUNG ADULTS BY DEAN FRANCIS ALFAR AND KENNETH YU
Dean Francis Alfar, one of the more widely recognized Filipino speculative fiction writers, has written many books in the genre. Salamanca, his first novel, is considered to be a modern classic.
In this collection, however, he edited science fiction stories for Filipino young readers, which might be the first in the Philippines. The collection features stories from known Filipino spec fic writers such as Victor Fernando Ocampo, Nikki Alfar, Eliza Victoria, and Gabriela Lee. This is really sure to please. Read More…
