Books
Monsoon Mansion: A Memoir (Little a, 2018)
Video: Monsoon Mansion: A Memoir + Cinelle Barnes, Amazon Publishing
"“Reminiscent of both Jeanette Walls’s memoir, The Glass Castle (2005), and Sandra Cisneros’s seminal novel The House on Mango Street (1984), this is a story of a tragic childhood told in a remarkably uplifting voice. Barnes imbues scenes from her interrupted childhood with an artistic touch that reads like literary fiction. Luminescent and shattering, Barnes’s first book is a triumph: a conquering of the past through the power of the written word.” —Booklist (starred review)
“Stuck in a tangled web of betrayal, Barnes’s harrowing coming-of-age memoir reveals the strength we don’t know we have until we are forced to use it.” —SheReads
“A young essayist’s memoir of her extraordinary riches-to-rags childhood in the Philippines…In this tender and eloquent tale, the author plumbs the depths of family dysfunction while telling a harrowing story of survival graced by moments of unexpected magic. A lyrically heartfelt memoir of resilience in the face of significant obstacles.” —Kirkus Reviews
“We implore you to get your hands on this harrowing and triumphant coming-of-age story set in the Philippines.” —Hyphen Magazine
Malaya: Essays on Freedom (Little a, 2019)
“A collection of essays extends and expands on the themes introduced in the author’s highly regarded memoir, Monsoon Mansion (2018). Barnes’s first book introduced a gifted writer with a compelling story about her life in the Philippines…A sturdy transitional volume that finds Barnes reflecting on her first and anticipating her next.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Barnes’s stirring follow-up to her memoir, Monsoon Mansion…continues her life story by sharing her life in America while undocumented…Barnes’s story is unforgettable, and highly relevant to 2019 America.” —Publishers Weekly
“Malaya, is a book on the uncompromising, unrelenting pursuit of a better life—to be free of fear and worries. These desires are universal. We are all immigrants in constant quest for freedom. Cinelle Barnes, Filipino American author, inspires with her endurance. But, like all stories, freedom is merely the beginning. For Barnes, life continues. This time, Barnes is ready. Her freedom empowers her.” —Positively Filipino
“Malaya is Barnes’s literary path forward, and for the reader, it is literary delight. The essays reflect interwoven threads but each sings with a unique, and effective, style—there’s a playfulness of form and chronology that keeps the reader engaged. We are with Barnes when she’s scrubbing toilets and working in a laundromat; when she’s nannying for a Wall Street family; when she’s dodging INS at a hipster cafe in Harlem; when she’s navigating white privilege and racism with her in-laws in the Upstate. And in each setting, each essay, through each beautifully crafted line and deftly chosen image, we not only begin to understand her experience better, but our own.” —Charleston City Paper
“Cinelle Barnes considers how the chaos and discipline of dance kept the disparate parts of her being stitched together.” —Longreads
“The most effective pieces of Barnes’s collection render the ‘personal as political’ via sharp details and wide lens, such as the essay, ‘Genealogy,’ which opens with the family history (of white settlers and sons and daughters of the Confederacy) of Barnes’s husband and develops into Barnes’s interrogation of that history via her own personal history of first meeting, eventually marrying into, and forever changing this family. ‘Genealogy’ is demonstrative of the collection’s finest qualities and the power of the personal essay to refract the intersections of complex histories, our present moments, and our agency (or lack thereof) therein…” —International Examiner
A Measure of Belonging: Twenty-One Writers of Color on the New American South
“New and noteworthy: These essays — from Kiese Laymon, Toni Jensen and Aruni Kashyap, among others — challenge the idea of a monolithic Southern culture.” —New York Times Sunday Book Review
"Sharp and witty, this collection shows that there are many different ways to live, breathe, thrive and be a person who belongs in the South." —Bookpage (starred review)
"One of the things that makes this essay collection so powerful is its focus on the nuances of racism. We all know the KKK is racist, but what about that smiling white woman at the dinner party? In what ways does she undermine someone’s sense of belonging? What about microaggressions? That is the issue here." —Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"The South on exhibit here does feel new: polygot, multiracial, small-c catholic, urbanized, unwilling to accomodate or overlook the past but instead primed to confront it head-on, and keen to sift the South's virtues—lovingly—from its flaws." —Garden & Gun
"Cinelle Barnes has compiled the most diverse portrayal of the contemporary South I've read to date. These beautifully-written, clear-eyed essays present the American South through the eyes of its black and brown voices and expand the reader's view of belonging to or hailing from the region. I love this collection and its depictions complicate the South in ways that mainstream America sometimes refuses to believe about our ugly/beautiful South. A Measure of Belonging is a major contribution to the canon of Southern literature and each of the writers give of themselves fully. It is a book for our times. Welcome to the 21st century!" —Crystal Wilkinson, author of The Birds of Opulence
"Totally engaging, this informing, thought-provoking collection is valuable for its vision of a South that is not monolithic."—Publishers Weekly
"Across the collection, the writers push against the limits of what we think we know about the South." —Kirkus Reviews
"The collective is an imaginative, colorful collage of narrative that paints a clear and nuanced picture of the contemporary south, delivered with humor, sass, and pride. Readers will walk away with a portrait of modern southern ideologies and the hope for a new approach to old constructs." —LaParis Hawkins, Booklist
"A Measure of Belonging is a stark reminder that, behind the draping magnolias and weeping willows, the south has a loaded history, the effects of which still ripple through today’s society. Cinelle Barnes’ anthology is but one call to awareness, a call to artful rebellion." —NewPages