by Joseph F. Nacino

Twenty-five detainees were lined up outside Selda 34 under the pouring monsoon. Many were dressed in regular shorts, slippers, and shirts. A few wore sandos, their bare shoulders shivering in the cold. Sullen and red-eyed, they squatted with their hands on their heads in the small courtyard of the police station, watched over by a handful of policemen taking shelter under the station’s roofed inner corridors.

Among the detainees was 16-year-old Binoy, trembling from being drenched by the rain. He vainly tried to stop his teeth from chattering.

Philippine Genre Stories has always aspired to be able to publish stories exploring the genres in the Philippine languages. In 2024, in addition to the submissions of previously unpublished genre stories in English, PGS is opening its portals for submissions of previously unpublished genre stories written in any of the native languages with an English translation.

With Mia Tijam, author of the 40^th National Book Award Finalist for Short Fiction in English “Flowers for Thursday”, co-editor of Philippine Speculative Fiction Sampler, and editor for the Special Section for PWDs and PADs of the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ Literary Journal ANI 41: LAKBAY, still serving as Guest Editor, please email your submissions to philippinegenrestories(at)gmail(dot)com.

Celestine Trinidad is a pathologist who writes fiction of various genres in her spare time, including speculative fiction, romance, crime, young adult, and children’s short stories. Her other stories have been published in various print and online venues such as Philippine Speculative Fiction, Philippines Free Press, Philippines Graphic, and Insignia. She won the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Award for Literature in 2008 for her short story for children “The Storyteller and the Giant”.

Her first official published work was in Philippine Genre Stories Issue 2 with the story “Beneath the Acacia”, based on the legend of Maria Sinukuan and her suitor Tikbalang, back when she was just in her first year in med school. She was published again in Philippine Genre Stories 2012 for her story Under A Mound Of Earth (Part 1) and Under A Mound Of Earth (Part 2). Celestine returns to Philippine Genre Stories 2023 with her story “THE ONES WHO LINGER”.

by Celestine Trinidad

Illustration by Shai San Jose.

It was almost midnight. Isa unlocked the door to the church using the keys she had borrowed from the parish office that morning. “Borrowed” was maybe not the term the parish secretary would use for what she did, because Isa had taken the keys from his desk without his knowing while he was distracted with the papers for her mother’s funeral mass. She would return it after tonight anyway, so it wasn’t stealing.

Sharmaine Galve is an entrepreneur by force, a writer by passion, and an electric biker by accident. She has been a fictionist since high school, an editor-in-chief in college, and was first published in Philippine Free Press in the late 90s. She had been published in Philippine Graphic as well and won third prize for a short story on mental illness. She loves a lot of things artistic: books, movies, music, paintings and the occasional plays.

Sharmaine was published in Philippine Genre Stories Volume 1, Issue 3 with the story “Y” which was inspired by the “Nature vs. Nurture” issue. She recalls that the last time she wrote a story was in 2015 and she shares her return to writing stories through “DIFFERENTIAL” in Philippine Genre Stories 2023.