Overview

As a young girl growing up in California, Pati Navalta was amazed and dismayed to watch her Grandma Fausta washing clothes by hand when there was a perfectly good washer and dryer in the house! Only years later did she begin to understand how much she had needed this native Filipina to bring her own heritage to her door. After Fausta came to California to help care for Pati and her brother, three more grandparents arrived, one by one. She came to think of them as the Oracles because of the mysterious, sometimes stifling, but ultimately important traditions they brought with them. The Oracles is the vivid memoir of a gifted young writer who, like so many others, has struggled with the traditional values of a culture she has never known. In sharp and unforgettable glimpses we see the shadows of superstition, the force of religion, and the embrace of family-sometimes welcome, sometimes not. Navalta presents an altogether honest and engaging portrait of generational strife and the clash of values in a Filipino American household that seeks to maintain its ties to family and homeland.

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Reviews

In...Pati Navalta Poblete's memoir about growing up under the care of four Filipino grandparents she named The Oracles, we find out just how severe culture clashes can be between the Philippines and Vallejo. - SF Gate Pati Navalta Poblete's memoir is a typical story of an American childhood. When her grandmother, Fausta, arrives from the Philippines, the American childhood then becomes a multigenerational tale of familial mythmaking and vivid storytelling. - Shawn Wong, author of Homebase and American Knees, and co-editor of Aiiieeeee!: An Anthology of Asian American Writers Absolutely relevant and beautiful memoir. One of a kind, although I wish there were more Filipina-American authors out there publishing books like this. I related to and loved this memoir so much that it has become the topic of my thesis. - Reader Review, Amazon Being an adult Filipino born in the Philippines and raised in the U.S. since I was 3 years old, I really enjoyed this book. I didn't have living grandparents to raise me so it was fun reading Pati's experience. I could relate to all the Filipino traditions that her grandparents were trying to instill in her. I enjoyed her storytelling and read the book in one day! I recommend this book to any Filipino born in the U.S. or the Philippines. - Reader Review, Amazon

Author Information

Pati Navalta is the author of two books, and is a longtime San Francisco Bay Area journalist and media and communications strategist, previously serving as Editorial Writer and Columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, where she was twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for an editorial series on the need for foster care reform in California. The series led to landmark changes in foster care in the state, improving the lives of millions of foster youth. In her second memoir, A Better Place, Pati shares the story of her painful but hopeful journey toward healing from the loss of her son, Robby, by gun violence in 2014. To honor Robby, Pati founded The Robby Poblete Foundation in 2017 to get unwanted weapons out of circulation, and through arts and training programs, turn them into objects of hope and opportunity. Pati is currently the Founder and President of Navalta Media. Please visit navaltamedia.com for more.

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