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Remains
A novel set in the aftermath of Supertyphoon Yolanda in Tacloban.
328 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
March 13, 2021
Actual rating: 3.5
Review to come.
Review to come.
March 20, 2021
You can hover to my long blog post about this book in the meantime
I shall post a summarized book review soon. Hang on!
I shall post a summarized book review soon. Hang on!
February 22, 2021
Daryll Delgado’s 2019 debut novel, “Remains” is an important recollection of recent devastation. It gracefully hinges narrative in a precise immersion of aftermath we all wished could be washed off. The novel follows Ann as she trudges of what remains of Tacloban after receiving the unnerving brute of Typhoon Haiyan (locally known as Yolanda) and captures an honest snapshot of the place for a scoping project for an NGO. Along with Ann’s personal histories, interjected with the narrative are the narratives of the locals who survived the tragedy.
I’ve been a huge fan of Delgado’s prose since reading her 2013 collection “After the Body Displaces Water.” Her economics to words and knowing precisely the most effective ones to use to present an unnerving immersion to the narrative is unparalleled. And this work presents further evidence into that acclaim.
The novel doesn’t demand or begs for its audiences’ attention. It knows it fully deserves its attention and rather gifts its audiences unmatchable synesthesia on the narrator’s psyche, first-person accounts, and most of all the environment as a whole. Coupled with intriguing plot points established in the first few chapters for backbone, we have a very palpable narrative.
Moreover, I think there is magic in the narrative in which we establish this dynamic between the diaspora (Ann), the outsider (the audience), and the first-hand witnesses that were transcribed in the presentation of the narrative.
While upon finishing the novel, I felt that there are some plot points established that were unresolved. Perhaps intentional. Perhaps none. Nonetheless, this still not change the fact of the wonderful work Delgado has on this.
Powerful and immersive, “Remains” may be one of the best reads I’ll have for this year!
I’ve been a huge fan of Delgado’s prose since reading her 2013 collection “After the Body Displaces Water.” Her economics to words and knowing precisely the most effective ones to use to present an unnerving immersion to the narrative is unparalleled. And this work presents further evidence into that acclaim.
The novel doesn’t demand or begs for its audiences’ attention. It knows it fully deserves its attention and rather gifts its audiences unmatchable synesthesia on the narrator’s psyche, first-person accounts, and most of all the environment as a whole. Coupled with intriguing plot points established in the first few chapters for backbone, we have a very palpable narrative.
Moreover, I think there is magic in the narrative in which we establish this dynamic between the diaspora (Ann), the outsider (the audience), and the first-hand witnesses that were transcribed in the presentation of the narrative.
While upon finishing the novel, I felt that there are some plot points established that were unresolved. Perhaps intentional. Perhaps none. Nonetheless, this still not change the fact of the wonderful work Delgado has on this.
Powerful and immersive, “Remains” may be one of the best reads I’ll have for this year!
November 8, 2021
Set during the aftermath of Super Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda, Daryll Delgado beautifully weaves between the present and the past; the professional and the personal, the professional and the personal, the memory with actual other first-person accounts of a horrendous tragedy. Seldom do I find books that do not romanticize so-called survivor or witness narratives. Remains is one of them.
Environmental impact documenter Ann returns to her hometown Tacloban after being away for more than 20 years. Primarily hired to conduct preliminary research on the ground post-typhoon, Ann tries to squeeze in a mission of her own – to learn more about the death of a friend’s daughter. While I would prefer some resolution to this mystery (kept me on edge up to the last page), the lack of closure offers realization that “despite changes in life, some things will continue, will remain as they were”- silences. In a remarkable and unapologetic way, this climate fiction features Waray transcripts (with English translations) from some of those affected by the typhoon. The presence of these conversations, along with Ann’s personal memories, effectively captures the pain and loss brought by trauma.
Environmental impact documenter Ann returns to her hometown Tacloban after being away for more than 20 years. Primarily hired to conduct preliminary research on the ground post-typhoon, Ann tries to squeeze in a mission of her own – to learn more about the death of a friend’s daughter. While I would prefer some resolution to this mystery (kept me on edge up to the last page), the lack of closure offers realization that “despite changes in life, some things will continue, will remain as they were”- silences. In a remarkable and unapologetic way, this climate fiction features Waray transcripts (with English translations) from some of those affected by the typhoon. The presence of these conversations, along with Ann’s personal memories, effectively captures the pain and loss brought by trauma.
September 18, 2024
Reading this unlocked so many feelings inside of me: awe, fear, distress, and everything in between; oscillating between one and the other. I remember when Ondoy nearly submerged our home, four years before Yolanda. As a kid I couldn’t fathom then what we had gone through in real time. It was only after the waters receded could I make sense of it all, of what remained.
In one exchange with her mother, Ann, an NGO worker and the book’s narrator, is told to “bear witness” to the people of Tacloban who were devastated by a super typhoon. “Just be present… Listen to people’s stories. You don’t speak for them, you let them speak.” What Daryll Delgado has accomplished here is quite special, and I believe will go down not just as an important contemporary work, but as a luminous act of witnessing.
In one exchange with her mother, Ann, an NGO worker and the book’s narrator, is told to “bear witness” to the people of Tacloban who were devastated by a super typhoon. “Just be present… Listen to people’s stories. You don’t speak for them, you let them speak.” What Daryll Delgado has accomplished here is quite special, and I believe will go down not just as an important contemporary work, but as a luminous act of witnessing.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews