Ligo Na U, Lapit Na Me: Book Review

When I first laid my eyes on Eros Atalia’s Peksman (Mamamatay Ka Man) Nagsisinungaling Ako in one of the shelves in National Bookstore, it already caught my attention. Aside from its bizarre title and book cover—in the cover is an ugly and dirty-looking old man with a disgusting set of teeth and has his right arm risen as if making a promise—but what really dazzled me is the author of the book. To my surprise, Eros Atalia is a PNU alumnus. He’s a PNUan just like me! This piece of information gave me an instant sense of school pride. Right then and there, I told myself that I should buy his books or at least one of his books for now. I had planned to buy the Peksman but I was dazzled yet again to know that he was the creator of Ligo Na U, Lapit Na Me. Ligo Na U was premiered in local cinemas as an independent film but I didn’t get to watch it. So when I had the money, I bought Ligo Na U instead of Peksman.

The title and the book design of Ligo Na U are also very catchy. In the cover there’s an old man—the same man in Peksman’s cover—and a young lady whose maybe in her late teens or early twenties who are sitting in the street beside a poso with the kids around. The lady is wiping the man’s foot with her hair while the kids are just watching them. At first, you’ll think that the setting happened in a depressed area and Intoy is the old man. But the picture was actually just a dream of Benzon—Intoy’s unhinged pal. According to Benzon, this dream is a sign that the aliens are going to capture the Earth. I remember that there’s a same scene happened in the Bible where a woman washed Jesus’ feet with perfume and wiped it dry using her hair. It’s a great design but the man shouldn’t be old because Benzon is not old. (Yes, Benzon is the man in the cover and the girl is the girl that he has an ultimate crush on.)

Anyway, I read the book with full anticipation and high expectation. But to my great despair, I was deeply disappointed. The plot is plainly simple, it was basically about the relationship of Intoy and Jen. Intoy is a not so good looking, not so smart, and not so rich college dude, while Jen is a beautiful and well-off college girl. Intoy and Jen’s life intertwined when Jen had been caught by the school guard having sex with her boyfriend during that time in one of the classrooms of her former Catholic school. Although what they’d done was ostensibly illegal and punishable, the school administration didn’t want to create a bad publicity for the school so instead of expelling Jen and her boyfriend, they just had an internal arrangement that the two should leave and transfer to another university in their own “free will” instead.

Obediently, Jen did what she was told to do. In her third year in college, Jen transferred to a state university. Being as gorgeous as she is in a place where beautiful women are endangered species; Jen grabbed every people’s attention. Boys want to be with her; girls want to be like her. Every living creature in the university adores her but Intoy, or so he pretended. Intoy is neither handsome nor smart nor rich, but his indifference had been his route to get Jen’s attention. Jen was appalled that a pretty girl like her has been ignored by a dude like Intoy. But later on, Jen and Intoy became friends, or more than friends. They became friends with benefits.

Jen is very promiscuous. She goes for casual sex. She fucks around. Commonly, this type of behavior has underlying causes, like broken family, child molestation, or even social deprivation. But surprisingly, Jen didn’t experience any of those. Jen grew up in a rather well-off and holistic family. In here, the author wants to point out that whatever type of individual we turned out to be, the society and the person’s experiences shouldn’t be blamed.

Hmm, very humanistic, but I totally disagree with this. I believe that in some point or another, the person’s early experiences in life are great contributors to the individual’s total personality, and so as the environment in which the person belongs. Jen was disturbed without second thought. She was even asking Intoy what the ideal time to commit suicide is. I had a strong feeling that Jen was suffering a major emotional landscape, aside from being impregnated by another man. The sad thing is, there was no way the readers would know what was it because the author didn’t bother to discuss it or to even give a hint of what was going on in Jen’s life. All I know is she’s rich and gorgeous and promiscuous—nothing more.

The story ends without a closure because according to Atalia, the concept of closure is just for the people who are lazy to know the real end of a story. In fairy tales they always end the story with “They live happily ever after,” but the story doesn’t really end there. It’s just the middle point of their lives. Atalia said that in real life, people just come and go. That’s why in his novel, Jen just disappeared suddenly.

I agree that there are people who come and go in our lives and there’s really no happily ever after, because after the marriage, new problems will surely sprout in a couple’s life. But the point is, real life is different from fiction. We read and write fiction because real life is vague and boring, while fiction is made to be artistic and entertaining. Jen is just a chapter in Intoy’s life, but that chapter must have a closure so the next chapter will flow smoothly, so the chapters in Intoy’s life will have a sense of coherence and unity. If Atalia thinks that closure are just for writers who are lazy to know the “real” ending, for me, his idea is just an excuse for his own laziness in putting a closure or at least a decent open end in his work.

Ligo Na U is not a novel. It’s a collection of the author’s random opinions about random issues that disguises itself as a novel. The story—heck, it’s still a “story”—was a roller coaster of events that has nothing to do with the heart of the freaking “story”. It seemed like I was reading a published blog than a novel.

Another sad thing is, there are some points of view that I can’t make sense with. Like the one about sports. The author was saying that we shouldn’t make things complicated. He said the basketball ring should be lowered and the court should be smaller, yaddi yaddi yadda… It doesn't make sense because the sports are made that way because of the spirit of the game. The complicacy makes the game exciting and fun. No one will enjoy playing Basketball or any other kind of sports if there’s no spirit of challenge and competition.

He said we should come up to more “creative sports” like pataasan ng ihi, pabanguhan ng jebs, o palakihan ng kulangot. I doubt if somebody will agree with his ideas. Obviously because ihi, jebs, and kulangot are gross enough as they are that even hearing those words is enough to lose somebody’s appetite. (I’m actually losing mine while writing this down.) These crazy ideas will not sell at all, so stop this craziness for goodness’ sake!

Throughout the book, the author tried to sound smart and funny but he unfortunately can’t. I can’t help but think that Eros Atalia is a certified frustrated Bob-Ong-wannabe. His insane/irrational ideas are neither brilliant nor funny. He is neither brilliant nor funny.