Noel Alumit — Talking to the Moon

Noel Alumit

Talking to the Moon

Nurse Belen Lalaban and her letter-carrier husband, Jory, came to America from the Philippines to escape, among other things, their class-crossed origins (she was a rich debutante, he a poor seminarian). In 1999, the couple are just three years away from paying off the 30-year mortgage on their Los Angeles home when Jory is shot by a white supremacist. Alumit entwines the inner lives and memories of Jory; Belen; and their American-born, 30-year-old son Emerson, as the family copes with hospital life, media attention and their disintegrating relationships with religion and each other. None can speak frankly, but each finds comfort in apostrophe; Jory talks to the moon, Belen to the Virgin Mary, and Emerson to the ghost of his dead brother, Jory Jr. (“Jun-Jun”).

Publisher: Da Capo Press