Adrift and All you Knead is Love are two middle grade novels with vastly different premises. Yet reading them you will find a common thread exploring multiracial Filipinx identity and the complications of family relationships. That is no coincidence, according to Philippines-based author Tanya Guerrero. “I think children from all kinds of families need to see themselves portrayed in the books they are reading…. I want my stories to reflect experiences of kids with single moms or dads, kids with siblings or half/step siblings or even only children (like my daughter), kids who have to move around a lot, kids who are mixed-race, etc.”
Take All you Knead is Love for example. Twelve year old Alba is Filipina/Spanish and apprehensive to stay the summer with her estranged Filipina grandmother in Spain, even if it means dealing with her father’s abusive comments and mother’s shrinking self-esteem. However, Barcelona defies her expectations as Alba finds healing and her Spanish roots all while baking bread at a friend’s bakery. The intimacy of Alba’s self discovery stems from Guerrero’s experiences moving from the Philippines to Spain, “When my parents separated, my sister and I moved to Barcelona for a few years to live with our maternal grandparents, while our mom settled in New York City. Prior to that, we had visited Spain before, but living there was a whole new experience. Life was really different there than what we were accustomed to in Manila. For one, I wasn’t fluent in Spanish, so I had to immerse myself to learn the language as fast as I could. Thankfully, my grandfather spoke English, so at least communicating at home wasn’t such a struggle. But my grandmother, on the other hand, barely spoke any English at all. So at the beginning, we communicated through cooking and shopping in the local markets. In a way, the language of food worked as a means for us to grow closer”.
In Adrift cousins Isa and Coral are both Filipino and white and have always been inseparable. However when Coral’s family boat capsizes at sea, readers follow as Coral fights for survival on a deserted island somewhere in the tropics while Isa struggles with survivor’s guilt while trying to find any traces of Coral. This particular narrative required balancing two emotionally charged perspectives, “I purposefully decided to include two points of view—one character surviving the elements, and the other character surviving the impact of losing a sisterly figure. Most of the survival books I’d read in the past were mostly about the characters’ plight to survive, with barely any mention of their loved ones who were left behind. But in the real world, it is much more a two-sided story. So to honor that, I wanted to reflect on what both sides were going through.”
Whether it is in a bakery in Europe, or a faraway island, Guerrero finds stories everywhere, “My surroundings also inspire me, especially nature and new places I’ve traveled to.” Her next novel Anatomy of a Curse was borne by such wanderings, based on the “supposedly cursed painting by one of the Philippines’ most famous painters, Juan Luna.
Guerrero’s inspirations may be varied in origin, but the main takeaway she wishes for her readers is to “stay true to yourself”. In her own words, “ I struggled a lot with my identity as a mixed race Asian, and it led me to a lot of difficulties when it came to finding the places that I felt like I fit in. When I was around white people, I wasn’t white enough. When I was around Asian people, I wasn’t Asian enough….. It was only when I got older, like in my thirties, that I finally felt 100% confident with who I was. I only wished I’d had books to read and mentors that would have given me this confidence earlier in life.”
