Patrick Joseph Caoile
"These warm, intimate Tales from Manila Ave. depict the lives of Filipino immigrant families with such attentive care, you can practically smell the nilaga stewing in the kitchen. Patrick Joseph Caoile has made a feast out of everyday ingredients: a cup of coffee, a nursery rhyme, or even an old game show episode delivers sudden, profound insights on love and grief, alienation and belonging, and the ties that bind and burden across generations and hemispheres. This is a book to savor, share, and remember for years to come."
— Mia Alvar, author of In the Country
Patrick Joseph Caoile was born in the Philippines and grew up in New Jersey. His work is featured in Solstice Literary Magazine, Chestnut Review, storySouth, Porter House Review, Bright Flash Literary Review, and elsewhere. His debut short story collection Tales from Manila Ave. (Sundress Publications) will release in fall 2025. He has received support from Roots.Wounds.Words and the Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. He holds a BA in English from Saint Peter's University, MA in English from Seton Hall University, and PhD in English concentrating in Creative Writing from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Currently, he is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Literature and Creative Writing at Hamilton College.
NEWS
Patrick's short story collection Tales from Manila Ave. was the winning selection of Sundress Publications' 2024 Prose Open Reading Period. The book will release in fall 2025.
Patrick received a Poet & Author Fellowship from the Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing and attended the 2024 Summer Writers' Conference.
Patrick's fiction manuscript Tales from Manila Ave.: Stories was named a semi-finalist in the Autumn House Press 2023 Contest.
Patrick joined the Literature and Creative Writing Department at Hamilton College as a Visiting Assistant Professor in fall 2023.
Patrick received the 2023 Bernice and Robert Webb Award for Excellence in Teaching at the Advanced Level from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
Patrick was recently a fellow in the inaugural 2022 RWW Writers’ Retreat for Storytellers of Color. As part of the fiction cohort, he was mentored by Deesha Philyaw, author of the critically acclaimed and award-winning fiction collection The Secret Lives of Church Ladies.