Brown Rice

Brown Rice is a memoir that reads like an adventure-humor-romance-thriller set in Philippines during the turbulent years of the Marcos dictatorship of the 60s and 70s. It's a coming-of-age story of Spike, who idolizes JFK, joins the fraternity of Marcos, and is in search of the woman a psychic claims would change his life. Spike's father is an adman who wrote a musical he wants to sell to Broadway. Spike's mother is an art teacher struggling to raise eight children on a tight budget as her husband battles poor health and prejudice for better employment. The backdrop of Manila in the 70s, student demonstrations, barricades, and tyranny puts the reader in the midst of the First Quarter Storm, the unrest and turmoil that preceded the declaration of Martial Law, the start of the Marcos dictatorship. The characters from high school, college and the fraternity who get involved in Spike's life are funny, genuine and unforgettable. The story starts in 1958 and builds in a cascading series of conflict, struggle and victory. The pages turn until the tumultuous and unexpected ending in 1980.