The big bad Filipino reader

Long before Jacqueline Ng discovered how seriously Filipinos take their fiction, she saw another side of the Philippines.

It was 2017, a year before Big Bad Wolf Books would hold its first sale in Manila. Ng, the book sale’s co-founder and executive director, had just arrived from Singapore and was on her way to a meeting with a potential partner.

What stayed with her was not the meeting. It was the two-hour drive from the airport.

“I was dozing off and waking up in the car, then I start to notice, you know, the people at the roadside, right? And then I start to see why are there so many families. I mean, when we travel, we do see homeless people,” she told the Daily Tribune.

What startled her was seeing entire families, including children, living without permanent shelter.

That first encounter complicated what Ng thought she knew about Filipinos.

Growing up in Singapore, she was familiar with Filipinos working abroad — nurses, hotel workers, retail employees and nannies, many of them college-educated and fluent in English. Arriving in the Philippines showed her a much wider reality.

“But when I [came] here, I [realized] that not all of them actually have that privilege,” she said. “There’s still a huge community [working incredibly hard], and they don’t speak a word of English, and they don’t get to work outside [the] Philippines.”

For Ng, this disparity became a driving purpose, giving Big Bad Wolf a reason to come to the country beyond simply selling books. She realized that making English books accessible at a lower price point could mean a great deal to these underserved communities.

Big Bad Wolf eventually partnered with a non-governmental organization through its Red Readerhood charity initiative, bringing donated books to underserved communities.

Ng also visited communities and met residents whose experiences changed the way she understood homelessness.

“That is the world that we want to change, [so] that every child would have a better, fairer opportunity in life,” she said. “As long as they [are] willing to dream, everything is possible.”

A Manila gamble

Bringing Big Bad Wolf to Manila in 2018 was itself a gamble.

The only available schedule at the World Trade Center fell around Chinese New Year, traditionally a time Ng and many members of her team spent with their families.

The alternative was to wait another year.

However, her head of events urged her to take the leap, having witnessed the same poverty Ng had seen. The team knew that if they missed this single booking window, they would have to delay the Manila launch by an entire year.

The team chose Manila.

“Nobody [had] heard about Big Bad Wolf. Nobody [knew] what it was about,” Ng recalled.

What they eventually discovered was a market unlike many of the countries Big Bad Wolf had entered.

In markets where English is not the first language, Ng said children’s books tend to dominate. Adult fiction sections can be quieter because buyers may need more guidance on authors, genres or even how particular children’s books are used.

The Philippines broke that pattern.

“But when you come to [the] Philippines, the most congested [section] is fiction, because Filipinos read. They know what they like.”

Filipino readers did not need much introduction.

“They know the genre, the authors, titles, they know what this book is about,” she said.

For a book sale built partly around discovery, Filipino shoppers arrived already knowing what they were hunting for.

Five books on her list

For someone whose work revolves around millions of books, Ng has a personal reading list that moves easily from fiction and memoir to faith.

First is Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, a novel narrated by Christopher Boone, a 15-year-old boy who sets out to investigate the death of a neighbor’s dog.

What stayed with her was the perspective from which the story was told.

“It puts [you] in the first person... as an autistic child,” Ng said. “Literally, you get into the mind [of an] autistic child, [to] see things or buildings [the way they do].”

She also counts James Herriot’s books among her favorites. Herriot chronicled his experiences as a veterinarian working in Yorkshire, England, in stories filled with animals, farmers and rural life.

Another title on her list is Melinda French Gates’ The Moment of Lift, which explores women’s empowerment through Gates’ experiences in philanthropy around the world.

“The title alone didn’t speak much to me at first, but when I started reading the book, I realized the moment of lift, when she described it, is when you are in a situation where you are doing something [impactful].”

Ng also has a soft spot for Mitch Albom, particularly Tuesdays with Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven.

Her fifth choice goes back much further than anything else on the list.

“I think the most important book is the Holy Bible.”

‘Choose what you want’

Yet after years of taking Big Bad Wolf across different countries and seeing different kinds of customers, Ng said her favorite sight at the sale is not necessarily a reader finding a coveted title. It is a parent standing beside a child.

For families accustomed to calculating what fits into the household budget, the words “choose what you want” can carry unusual weight.

“The parents [feel] so contented and [proud] that they can afford to give the best. I mean, books [are] the best thing you can give to a child, especially if the child wants it and they choose whatever they want.”

Years after that first traffic-clogged drive through Manila, perhaps this is the image that best explains why Ng keeps returning: not merely shelves packed with discounted books, but the small freedom of being able to choose one.