I guess I had been hoping this book would be one of those things that would stoke that fire and galvanise me into furious action.

Nevertheless, it’s your responsibility to stay angry and focused, and keep searching for touchstones that hold jadedness at the loss of human life at bay. If you’ve lived with news of the drug war every day since 2016, you can’t help but reach a point of saturation in 2019. As the story is told from a visitor’s point of view, Jay’s perspective only just skims the surface of our inescapable day-to-day reality. I say this because as someone who lives in the midst of Duterte’s drug war here in the Philippines, the book does not hit me quite as hard as I expected it to. I will disclaim straight off that Patron Saints of Nothing is very much written for an audience like Jay - Filipinos living abroad who are looking for a primer to introduce them to Duterte’s drug war. So over spring break, Jay catches a plane to the Manila and sets about to find answers. Jay is overwhelmed with questions about Jun’s death, but his family remains tight-lipped with shame and resignation. At the end of his senior year, his cousin Jun is killed - one of the thousands of victims of President Rodrigo Duterte’s drug war in the Philippines. Patron Saints of Nothing is told from the point of view of Jay Reguero, who lives in the States with his Filipino immigrant father and American mother. And his murderer is one more poor soul trying to make a few pesos to feed his family.” Perfect for: Readers looking for an introduction to Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs in the Philippines

Patron saints of nothing randy ribay