ABOUT THE AUTHOR (for long bio click here) Brian Ascalon Roley was raised in Los Angeles of multiracial Filipino descent. He writes in several genres. Brian is the author of the award-winning novel, AMERICAN SON (W.W. Norton, 2001; Christian Bourgois Editeur, 2006), which was a Los Angeles Times Best Book, New York Times Notable Book, Kiriyama Pacific Rim Prize finalist, and winner of the 2003 Association of Asian American Studies Prose Book Award, among other honors. His work was also featured in the California Council for the Humanities statewide reading campaign of 2004 (involving libraries, book groups and classrooms across the state), and continues to be taught in classrooms at many high schools and universities across the country and internationally. His fiction, literary essays and poetry have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including Mixed: An Anthology of Short Fiction on the Multiracial Experience (W.W. Norton), Charlie Chan is Dead 2: An Anthology of Contemporary Asian American Fiction (Penguin), and several best selling anthologies in the Philippines. Currently he is an Associate Professor of English at Miami University of Ohio and spends most of his time with his family in Cincinnati and California. He recently finished a new story collection, The Last Mistress of Jose Rizal, forthcoming in Spring 2016, while on leave as a Visiting Fellow at the University of Cambridge. (for full bio click here) |
"Heartbreaking...American Son is a gripping book." Aleksandar Hemon, New York Times "Hard-hitting and brash, this debut novel takes a cold, clear-eyed look at the American immigrant experience...This is a powerhouse story of vulnerable strangers living in a brutal, alien land told with stylish restraint, bare-knuckled realism and tender yet tough clarity." -- Publisher's Weekly "Touching, disturbing." -- Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, Book Dragon Notable Book "American Son is brilliantly written. Roley is one of the most adept writers I have read at using spare descriptions for crisp characterization." -- Vince Gotera Professor of English and Editor Emeritus of The North American Review "Roley writes with assurance, grace and insight, and he plays expertly with our perceptions and expectations...And Roley is one young writer with something important to say: he has fused a coming-of-age story with a variant on the American immigrant saga, and the result is both explosive and illuminating." --Jonathan Kirsch, Los Angeles Times Book Review "Penetrating...Roley explores this omnipresent yet usually invisible story of contemporary American immigrant life with an easy exactitude and a dry, unmerciful eye...What's most memorable, and most disturbing, is how Roley subtly renders the difference between those who make the journey to America and those who are born out of their hopes...Clean, beautifully understated prose." --Suzy Hansen, Salon.com click here for more reviews |