‘The Son Of Good Fortune’ By Lysley Tenorio Explores Belonging And Place
Speaker 1: 00:00 Former San Diego and Leslie Tenorio is out with a new novel, the son of good fortune. It's not the first time we've read. [inaudible] work. His short story collection monstrous was KPBS, his 2014 one book, one San Diego selection. Here's the author. Leslie Tenorio speaking with KPBS arts editor, Julia Dixon Evans. Speaker 2: 00:22 The sun of good fortune explores the lives of two undocumented immigrants from the Philippines and mother and a son. The mother Maxima is a former B-movie action star and her son, Xcel is trapped in what can only be described as a dreadful job at a character pizza parlor. Can you tell me a little bit about this character, Xcel and what he wants in the world? Speaker 3: 00:48 So Excel is a 19 year old Filipino man, who, as you said is undocumented. He was actually born on a flight from Manila to San Francisco. So he doesn't really have a real sense of, of citizenship or, or home or place he and Maximo live in Colma, California, right outside San Francisco. And in order to get by she scams American men online, she kind of duped them into falling in love with her and, and wiring her money. And Excel works at a dead end pizza place called the pie who loved me, which is a spice themed kitty pizza parlor kind of modeled after Chuckie cheese. And he is just kind of aimless. And his prospects are so limited that when he has the opportunity to move to a sort of off the grid, desert community called hello city in Southern California, with his girlfriend SAB, he takes it. He decides here might be a place where I can reinvent myself where it doesn't really matter who you are or where you come from, just that you sort of do unto others. And so he sees hello city as this kind of place. That's sort of out of the regular confines of society or of a society that that is not so welcoming to, to undocumented images. Speaker 2: 02:07 I wanted to ask you more about place, because I think this book is a strong example of California fiction. There's a lot of hope and sunshine, but also that grimy underside. So how do you write characters who see themselves as placeless in a story so deeply rooted in a place like California? Speaker 3: 02:29 Um, I think when you are trying, whenever you craft a sort of fiction, whether it be a short story, novel, all these different components, plot, character setting, they all interact with one another. And so because my characters, XL and Maxima don't really have a home where aren't sure what their sense of home is. I think I really have to rely on the particulars of whatever setting I'm using. So in other words, I really try to look for things that really reflect who they are as characters. So even though I might set the story in the Bay area, for example, I find myself really drawn to Colma this, this town where the main industry is 17 cemeteries and where there's this strange spy themed pizza place, which is fictional. If I can find the nuances and even quirks of these places, I try to align them with, with the particulars of the characters themselves. So a story set in the Bay area, for example, I'm not necessarily looking at the expected Bay area landscape, I'm really looking for places or things that, that a lot of people might not associate with the Bay area. Speaker 2: 03:40 Another specific place then is hello city, this desert town where Xcel and his girlfriend spend some time trying to make their own life. And it feels very much like a very particular place down here near the border. Can you tell me a little bit about hello city and its origins for you? Speaker 3: 04:00 Hello city is actually based on an off the grid desert community called slab city slab city is a makeshift town that sort of was started on the remnants of what they call these, these concrete slabs that I believe were leftover from, from the military. Um, I did a lot of research to watch a lot of YouTube videos that no other city it's already set in a slab city and fought. You know, if, if I could take this idea of an abandoned military off the grid, desert town, maybe I can do something with this. And when I decided instead of these concrete slabs, I was going to have them be the, these leftover hella pads. I decided that it would be a, a former military place where helicopter combat training was, was its purpose. And, and of course failed. But what was leftover where the hell have pads and hella pads, I realize usually have a giant letter H in the middle. And I thought of, okay, what could H mean an H could mean hello? So I named the town, hello city, but as the, as Excel spends more time in hello city, he sometimes contemplates what H also might mean for him. It could mean home. It could mean hiding. It can mean anything really. Um, so I, I took a lot of creative liberties and thematic liberties with the setting of hello city. Speaker 2: 05:27 And on the flip side, you grew up in Mira Mesa. And how has a suburb like that informed your work? Speaker 3: 05:36 Well, Mira Mesa, um, which was a really wonderful multicultural place to grow up. And I mean, it certainly has a large Filipino community there. You know, I grew up, as I said, in a very multicultural community, when I look at my elementary school photos, it's such a mixed group of kids. And to me, that was just so normal. There really was America, and it wasn't a hyphenated America. It wasn't necessarily an immigrant America. It was just, Oh, this is my American childhood. This is my American school. This is my American reality. So because for me that was the norm. It was difficult at times to grow up and realize that nationally, that, that wasn't necessarily the norm, at least for a lot of people. And certainly in the ways that American cultures represented. So growing up in Mira Mesa ultimately became a kind of motivation for me to insist upon the presence of immigrant Americans, particularly Filipino immigrant Americans, Filipinos have been in America for a long time. The relationship between the Philippines and America has a long intertwined, complicated history. When I write fiction, one of my objectives is to really claim and, and put forth this idea that Filipinos are an integral part of the American reality. And I think growing up in Mira Mesa really instilled that belief in me. Speaker 2: 07:01 So your characters are incredibly lovable and they also exist on the margins, not just in terms of their undocumented status at maximum, for example, like you said, she scams men online for many. What is it about her that makes us root for her? Speaker 3: 07:21 Right. Well, I'm glad you, I'm glad you say that readers, hopefully we'll, we'll root for her. Cause I'm quite fond of Maxima. You know, she is someone who is doing the best. She can as a mother, as a woman, as someone living in America, she is a former B action movie star from the Philippines. I sort of want to be Filipina Michelle Yeoh, as she says in the novel, obviously those dreams didn't quite come to come to fruition. So America for her was like a last resort. So she does what she can for herself and for a child. And if it means that she has to scam men online, she'll do it as an undocumented immigrant. Her options are really limited. So my hope is that a reader who might understandably question the ethical nature of the things that she does, they might also recognize that this is someone who is incredibly strong and incredibly determined and maximum strength is something that I'm hoping readers will be drawn to so much of her character. And really this novel was about recognizing and honoring the strengths of this woman. This mother, one of Xcels challenges, I think is his sort of inability to recognize just how strong his mother is. Not just emotionally and psychologically, but, but even physically, um, because she was this martial arts artist, she's physically formidable. And I, I hope that her strength and her toughness, her snarkiness, I hope those are things that readers will really connect with and appreciate despite her flaws Speaker 2: 09:05 And for readers who first got to know your writing through short stories, you've been writing the stories of the Philippines and of immigrants for nearly 20 years now, maybe longer. Some of the stories in monstrous were first published in, I think, 2001, what's changed about telling these stories. Now, Speaker 3: 09:27 When I first started writing, I fell in love with writing and really fell in love with literature through short stories. The short story form was, was really my favorite form and it was always, it was always the way I conceptualize narrative. Uh, so working through those stories is that when monstrous, uh, really was about trying to capture a perfect narrative in let's say 20 pages. And so I was really obsessed with this idea of autonomy when you're writing a short story, you're, you're, you're really relying on compression and, and getting them, trying to get the most out of every sentence and every paragraph, every scene with the novel and, and trying to tell the story of Filipinos, Filipino immigrants, the novel, because it's obviously a longer form there's wiggle room for, for detours and for an even for mistakes. And I think that was a very difficult thing I had to, I had to learn, um, so much of a novel is trial and error because you, you go down these paths that the longer narrative just sort of leads you down and they don't always work. Speaker 3: 10:30 But the novel, I felt really required me to examine the interiority of these characters in ways that I, I don't know that I had to do as much in this short story with the short stories, my work tends to be plot driven. The short stories were sort of like getting, get out with a novel, you know, I, I needed these moments of pause to sustain the narrative. And those moments of pause are real opportunities to understand who these characters were psychologically and emotionally. So becoming a writer more concerned with that interiority was a very new experience for me. Speaker 2: 11:07 That was KPBS arts editor, Julia Dixon Evans speaking with former one book, one San Diego author, literally Tenorio about his new novel, the son of good fortune.
