Böcker av Miguel Syjuco

"Brilliant . . . Miguel Syjuco is his country's most original and unflinching literary voice." -Salman Rushdie"It's a rare novel that leaves you reeling simultaneously with admiration, exhaustion, amazement at its author's reach and skill, and desolation at the world it spreads out before you . . . [A] raging protest of a book." -James Lasdun, The New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)From Miguel Syjuco, the winner of the Man Asian Literary Prize for Ilustrado, I Was the President's Mistress!! is an unflinching satire about power, corruption, sex, and all the other topics you were told never to discuss in polite company.First came the Sexy-Sexygate scandal. Then an impeachment trial. Finally, a battle royale for the presidency. At the center of this political typhoon is Vita Nova, the most famous movie star in the Philippines and a former paramour of the country's most powerful man. Now, for the first time ever, she bares herself completely in a tell-all memoir that puts the sensational in sensationalistic.The setting: a sweating, heaving country. The time: right now. The plot: a drug war rages, an assassin brandishes a pistol, a damsel rises from ashes to power, and a government teeters on the brink. Among the players: a dreamer who boxed and acted his way to the presidency, his Koran-toting nemesis in the senate, a horny bishop, a cowboy turned warlord, a poor little rich boy dying with his dynasty, a washed-up reporter redeemed by one last scoop, a high-school sweetheart driven mad by decades of disappointment, and an American naval officer tempting our heroine with a way out. As Vita warns, viewer discretion is advised.In this masterful and audacious novel, Miguel Syjuco's signature style-hilarious, insightful, playful, provocative-animates thirteen indelible voices whose stories present a cross-section of a complicated society. I Was the President's Mistress!! hurtles headlong into love, politics, faith, history, memory, and the ongoing war over who will tell the stories the world shall know as truth.

"Brilliant . . . Miguel Syjuco is his country's most original and unflinching literary voice." -Salman Rushdie"It's a rare novel that leaves you reeling simultaneously with admiration, exhaustion, amazement at its author's reach and skill, and desolation at the world it spreads out before you . . . [A] raging protest of a book." -James Lasdun, The New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)From Miguel Syjuco, the winner of the Man Asian Literary Prize for Ilustrado, I Was the President's Mistress!! is an unflinching satire about power, corruption, sex, and all the other topics you were told never to discuss in polite company.How much would you sacrifice for what you believe? Is what you believe even true? And what if you secretly recorded the crimes of your once-trusted lover-who also happens to be the president? For Vita Nova, introverted megastar, such a conundrum could ruin everything. All she ever wished for was a quiet life as the Philippines' most-liked influencer, famous for her viral dance hit, the Mr. Sexy-Sexy-yet now somehow she's headlining a rollicking impeachment and battle royal for power. In these previously unreleased transcripts, collected by the ghostwriter of her tell-all memoir, Vita rips the bodice of society to bare her own heaving story. But some of her former lovers tell it differently, asking us: "Who's more sinful, the seduced or the seductress?" You are cordially invited to this year's biggest scandal. Will Vita prevail? Will she even survive? In his signature style-playful, provocative, hilarious, insightful-Miguel Syjuco animates thirteen indelible voices in this dizzying tale of democracy in peril. But this isn't a book about the Philippines; it's about a society uncannily like yours. I Was the President's Mistress!! is both an indictment of the violent potential of language and an electrifying defense of free speech. Come, confront today's last taboos and hurtle headlong into love, sex, ambition, politics, faith-and the war over who will tell the stories the world will know as truth.