Work samples

  • Preface to MONSTRESS

    For the re-issue of my story collection, MONSTRESS, in 2020, I was asked to write a preface for the book.  Rather than focus on the stories themselves, I wrote about why I started writing and still do: my family's immigration from the Philippines to America.  Pictured above are the green card photos for my mother (center, bottom row), my four older siblings, and me (bottom right corner).  I grew up seeing these photos, and the facial expressions of my family--so different, so private--have stayed with me my whole life.  Though we were together for one of the most pivotal moments of our lives, I was too young to remember it; writing fiction, then, has been a way to imagine the emotional and dramatic possibilities from that time in my family history, while at the same time exploring the complicated intersections between America and the Philippines. 

  • "Monstress" (short story/excerpt)

    "Monstress" is the title story from my short story collection of the same name, published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2012.  The story is about the making of a truly awful B-movie, a mash-up of old Filipino horror films and a cheesy American sci-fi flick, and is narrated by Reva Gogo, the Filipina actress who stars in the film.  The premise of the movie is actually inspired by a 1970 film called The Horror of the Blood Monsters. Considered one of the worst movies ever made, the film is the literal splicing of bad Filipino horror movies with a terrible American sci-fi film.  This bizarre clash-and-meld of Philippines and American cultures provided a framework for the story's plot, but more importantly, a context to explore deeper tensions and questions inherent to the immigrant story.  This is how I approach my fiction; my story collection hopefully illustrates that.  You can read the full text of "Monstress" below, as well two other stories from MONSTRESS.

     

  • THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE (excerpt from the prologue)

    This is an excerpt from the prologue to my novel, THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE, published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2020.  The novel focuses on nineteen-year-old Excel and his mother, Maxima, both undocumented Filipino immigrants living just outside San Francisco, doing what they can to get by: Excel works a miserable job at a spy-themed pizza joint called The Pie Who Loved Me, while Maxima scams men searching for subservient Asian wives online.  The novel explores the ways they fail and champion each other, while trying to figure out where they truly belong. You can read the rest of the prologue and the first two chapters down below.

    While the story is purely fictional, I had family who were undocumented, so I hope the novel honors the complexity and humanity of an undocumented existence.

  • "Aviary" (short story/excerpt)

    My short story, "Aviary" (originally published in MANILA NOIR (Akashic Books, 2013)) was inspired by a sign (pictured above) that was posted in Greenbelt Mall, one of the most exclusive malls in Manila.  The sign was supposedly a hoax but nonetheless evoked class tensions in the city, underscoring the troubling wealth gap between the country's elite and its poorest, most vulnerable populations.  You can read the full story down below.

About Lysley

Lysley Tenorio is the author of the story collection Monstress, named a book of the year by The San Francisco Chronicle, and the novel The Son of Good Fortune, winner of the New American Voices Award. His stories have appeared in The Atlantic, Ploughshares, Manoa, and Zoetrope: All-Story, and have been adapted the for the stage in San Francisco and New York City. A former Stegner Fellow at Stanford, he has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bogliasco… more

MONSTRESS (short story collection)

MONSTRESS is my short story collection (and first book), published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2012.  The book deals with the unexpected intersections between Philippine and American/Western culture, and most of the stories are based on real-world events and phenomena.  The full text of "Monstress," "Felix Starro," and "Save the I-Hotel" are here, followed by reviews for the book.  

Here is the description from the back cover:

Monstress introduces a bold new writer who explores the clash and meld of disparate cultures. In the National Magazine Award-nominated title story, a has-been movie director and his reluctant leading lady travel from Manila to Hollywood for one last chance at stardom, unaware of what they truly stand to lose. In "Felix Starro," a famous Filipino faith healer and his grandson conduct an illicit business in San Francisco, though each has his own plans for their earnings. And after the Beatles reject an invitation from Imelda Marcos for a Royal Command Performance, an aging bachelor attempts to defend her honor by recruiting his three nephews to attack the group at the Manila International Airport in "Help."

Lysley Tenorio reveals the lives of people on the outside looking in with rare skill, humor, and deep understanding, in stories framed by tense, fascinating dichotomies—tenderness and power, the fantastical and the realistic, the familiar and the strange. Breathtakingly original, Monstress marks the arrival of a singular new voice in American fiction.

 

 

 

  • Monstress Cover
    Monstress Cover

    The cover for the re-issue of MONSTRESS.

  • Full text of Monstress.pdf

    The full text of my short story "Monstress."

  • "Felix Starro" (short story)

    "Felix Starro" is about a young man named Felix Starro III, who is the grandson of and assistant to Felix Starro, a famous faith healer in the Philippines.  His faith healing, of course, is a scam, and after falling on tough times back home, the elder Felix Starro decides to bring his "business" to America, and heal unwitting Filipino Americans.  But the young Felix Starro sees this as an opportunity to leave the family business and start his own life in America.  "Felix Starro" is based on notable faith healer  Alex Orbito (famous for working with American actress Shirley Maclaine), who conducted "healing sessions" in Canada, and was arrested for his scam.

  • "Save the I-Hotel"

    "Save the I-Hotel" is a fictional account of the 1977 protest that took place at I-Hotel, a residential hotel in downtown San Francisco, which was known for housing the manongs--elderly Filipino men who'd come to America in the 1920's and 30's--and lived as lifelong bachelors, primarily due to anti-miscegenation laws of the time.  The protest fought against the eviction of the manongs, and is considered a landmark of Bay Area social protest.  The story was also inspired by Annie Proulx's "Brokeback Mountain," one of my favorite short stories of all time. 

  • Reviews for MONSTRESS.pdf

    A compilation of reviews for MONSTRESS.

THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE (novel)

THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE is my first novel (and second book), published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2020.  The novel tells the story of Excel and Maxima, an undocumented young man and his mother, living in Colma, CA, just outside San Francisco, and the ways they fail and champion each other.  A more detailed synopsis (aka jacket flap copy) is below, and included here are the prologue and the first two chapters, followed by reviews for the book.

Excel spends his days trying to seem like an unremarkable American teenager. When he’s not working at The Pie Who Loved Me (a spy-themed pizza shop) or passing the time with his girlfriend Sab (occasionally in one of their town’s seventeen cemeteries), he carefully avoids the spotlight.

But Excel knows that his family is far from normal. His mother, Maxima, was once a Filipina B-movie action star who now makes her living scamming men online. The old man they live with is not his grandfather, but Maxima’s lifelong martial arts trainer. And years ago, on Excel’s tenth birthday, Maxima revealed a secret that he must keep forever. “We are ‘TNT’—tago ng tago,” she told him, “hiding and hiding.” Excel is undocumented—and one accidental slip could uproot his entire life.

Casting aside the paranoia and secrecy of his childhood, Excel takes a leap, joining Sab on a journey south to a ramshackle desert town called Hello City. Populated by drifters, old hippies, and washed-up techies—and existing outside the normal constructs of American society—Hello City offers Excel a chance to forge his own path for the first time. But after so many years of trying to be invisible, who does he want to become? And is it possible to put down roots in a country that has always considered you an outsider?

Thrumming with energy and at once critical and hopeful, The Son of Good Fortune is a luminous story of a mother and son testing the strength of their bond to their country—and to each other.

  • THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE

    The prologue and chapters one and two from my novel, THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE.

  • Reviews for THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE.pdf

    A compilation of reviews for THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE.

"Aviary" (short story)

Published in 2013 by and edited by Jessica Hagedorn, MANILA NOIR (Akashic Books) is a collection of noir-themed short stories set in Manila, Philippines.  My short story, "Aviary," is included in the book.

  • The cover for MANILA NOIR.
    The cover for MANILA NOIR.
  • Aviary (short story).pdf

Stage Adaptations

When I'm writing fiction, I'm always thinking in terms of a book, of that potential one-on-one connection between the reader and the page.  So it's been exciting to know that other writers and artists have seen my work as something to transform for another medium entirely.  Over the years, I've had my short stories adapted into plays, staged readings, even an off-Broadway musical.  You can find out more about the stage adaptations for my stories "Monstress," "Save the I-Hotel," "The Brothers," and "Felix Starro" here.

  • Photo from Felix Starro, the musical.
    Photo from "Felix Starro," the musical.

    A moment from the Off-Broadway musical adaptation of "Felix Starro."  Photo by Richard Termine.

  • Theater program for "Monstress." (2015)

    The program for "Monstress."  Produced and staged in 2015 by the American Conservatory Theater, San Francisco's premiere theater company, "Monstress" was comprised of two one-act plays based on two of my short stories, "Monstress" and "Save the I-Hotel."  The plays were adapted by San San Jose and Philip Kan Gotanda and directed by Carey Perloff.  The program gives extensive background information on the production itself, as well as historical information on Filipino B-horror movies (the inspiration for "Monstress") and the International Hotel ("I-Hotel"), as well as its place in the San Francisco neighborhood formerly known as Manilatown.

  • NBC News story about "Save the I-Hotel."

    A story on NBC News about the adaptation of my short story "Save the I-Hotel" which, among other things, deals with same-sex relationships in 1930's San Francisco.

  • Poster for the stage adaptation of "The Brothers."

    When the American Conservatory Theater first approached me about adapting "Monstress" and "Save the I-Hotel," they were also interested in adapting my short story "The Brothers," which focuses a Filipino man dealing with the death of his transgender sister.  The person adapting the story was Colman Domingo, who has gone on to have a stellar acting career, with two Oscar nominations to his credit.  In 2018, he did a virtual staged reading of the play.

  • Poster for the musical adaptation of my short story Felix Starro.
    Poster for the musical adaptation of my short story "Felix Starro."

    In 2019, the Ma-Yi Theater Company, one of the leading Asian-American theater companies in the country, adapted my short story "Felix Story" and turned it into a musical.  Written by Jessica Hagedorn with music by Fabian Obispo, the production was the first Off-Broadway show with a Filipino cast and production team.  

  • NBC News story about "Felix Starro." (2019)

    A story from NBC News about the musical adaptation "Felix Starro."

  • Trailer for the musical "Felix Starro."

    A trailer for "Felix Starro."  Featured are Jessica Hagedorn, who wrote the script, and Ralph Pena, who directed the production.

THE COLLECTED SHORT STORIES OF BHARATI MUKHERJEE ("Afterword")

I became a writer because of Bharati Mukherjee.  Most famous for her National Book Critics Circle Award-winning story collection THE MIDDLEMAN, Mukherjee (1940-2017) was an Indian-American writer who wrote brilliantly about the contemporary immigrant experience in America, telling stories not only about immigrants from India, but from all over the globe.  She was my professor at UC Berkeley, where I went to college, and out of curiosity, I read THE MIDDLEMAN, and one particular story, called "Fighting For the Rebound" featured a Filipina character named Blanquita.  Though I'd been a reader my whole life, it was my first time seeing a Filipino character in American fiction, a fact that both amazed and troubled me.  How amazing to see Blanquita on the page!  But also: why did it take so long for me to find a character like her in the books I'd read?  THE MIDDLEMAN changed my life and made me think that, maybe, I could write stories that somehow spoke to my experience too.  

Mukherjee became my mentor and was really the first supporter of my work.  So when I was asked to write the Afterword for THE COLLECTED SHORT STORIES OF BHARATI MUKHERJEE, I was deeply honored.  It's one of the most important things I'd ever written, my way of saying "thank you."

  • The cover for THE COLLECTED SHORT STORIES OF BHARATI MUKHERJEE (2023)
    The cover for THE COLLECTED SHORT STORIES OF BHARATI MUKHERJEE (2023)
  • Afterword for THE COLLECTED STORIES OF BHARATI MUKHERJEE. (2023)

"The Children Go" (novel-in-progress)

My current project is a novel tentatively titled "The Children Go."  The novel focuses on Faustino Go, an elderly man from a rural village in the Philippines, whose seven grown children are spread across the globe, one on each continent.  Her children are all OFW’s—the term for Overseas Filipino Workers—and have left the Philippines, as well as their spouses and children—in order to find work abroad and send the bulk of their wages home.  His children work in various fields and industries: one daughter is a domestic worker in Australia while another is a nurse in Germany; one son plays guitar in hotel bands in Australia and does construction work in South Africa.  The novel follows the stories of Faustino’s children, while the overall narrative arc is powered by Faustino’s determination to reunite them one last time, back home in the Philippines, before their mother, Marivelle, completely succumbs to dementia.

The novel is inspired by the OFW phenomenon.  The Philippines government estimates at least 2.2 million Filipinos work abroad in over 100 different countries, and the money they send back home is critical to their economy, representing over 10% of the country’s GDP.  OFWs typically serve as domestic workers, caregivers, and in service industries, often leaving their families behind for years at a time, and while labor laws vary from country to country, it’s not uncommon for OFWs to be subjected to harsh, even inhumane working conditions.  Human trafficking remains a problem for OFWs, particularly in the Middle East and Asia, but has happened in the United States as well. 

Unquestionably, Filipinos working overseas face numerous hardships and challenges; at the same time, it’s essential to recognize the success that OFWs have found, and to explore the tension that, for many OFWs, their adopted country is now their home, and that returning to the Philippines is no longer an economically—or emotionally—viable option.  The novel examines the narrative possibilities of the OFW experience against the backdrop of different countries and cultures across the globe and, through the individual stories of Faustino’s children, explores several key questions: what does it mean to be Filipino when the culture at large defines who you are by the work you do?  Consequently, how does this tension of labor-as-identity impact Filipino self-perception?  And on a larger scale, when exploring Filipino migration in seven different continents, what does “Filipino-ness” mean in the global context?  These are essential but often overlooked questions in the conversation about Filipino migration; rather than answer them, “The Children Go” seeks to explore the possibilities of these questions.

  • Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) by the numbers.

    As indicated by the numbers and statistics above, the Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) is truly a global phenomenon.  The number one "export" of the Philippines is human labor, and the money OFWs send back to the Philippines is, as of 2022, at least 9% of the nation's GDP.  Their work is essential but their reality is undeniable: the majority of OFWs leave their families behind for years in order to find work abroad, resulting in broken marriages, whole generations of children raised without their parents, and of course, the cultural challenges of living day-to-day in their host countries.  While "The Children Go" focuses on one particular family, their stories will hopefully with larger truths about the OFW experience. 

  • Presentation on "The Children Go" at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, 2022

    I was fortunate to receive a 2021-22 fellowship at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, where I worked on my novel-in-progress, "The Children Go."  This is my Fellow's Presentation on my project, along with a short reading from my novel, THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE, followed by a Q&A.

  • Excerpt from "The Children Go." (2024)

    An excerpt from the opening chapter from my novel-in-progress "The Children Go."

Book Reviews for THE NEW YORK TIMES

Like many writers, I occasionally review books.  Included here are my New York Times reviews for the novels, MY GOOD SON (2021) by Yang Huang and A NEARBY COUNTRY CALLED LOVE (2023) by Salar Abdoh.

  • New York Times Review of MY GOOD SON. (2021)
  • New York Times Review of A NEARBY COUNTRY CALLED LOVE. (2023)

Press and Interviews

  • Interview about THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE from THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE. (2020)
  • NEW YORK TIMES review of THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE. (2020)
  • Interview about MONSTRESS with THE PARIS REVIEW. (2012)
  • NPR review of MONSTRESS. (2012)
  • Interview with Daniel Handler (aka Lemony Snicket) on THE SON OF GOOD FORTUNE. (2020)
  • Point Loma Writer's Symposium: Conversation about MONSTRESS. (2015)