President Rodrigo Duterte’s deadly drug war has been discussed in TV shows and films since it launched in 2016, and now, it has also become the backdrop for an upcoming Young Adult novel.
Published under Penguin Young Readers’ Kokila imprint, Patron Saints of Nothing tells the story of Jay Reguero, a Filipino-American teenager who goes to the Philippines during his senior year of high school after learning that his cousin was killed in Duterte’s anti-narcotics crackdown.
It was written by Filipino-American Randy Ribay, the author of YA novels After the Shot Drops and An Infinite Number of Parallel Universes.
The story also acts as a jump-off point to discuss culture and identity as Jay learns about life in the Philippines.
Book review magazine Kirkus gave the book a star and called it a “powerful and courageous story [that] offers readers a refreshingly emotional depiction of a young man of color with an earnest desire for the truth.”
Patron Saints of Nothing comes out in June and is now available for pre-order on Amazon.
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