MANILA - To celebrate the birth centenary of National Artist for Literature Nick Joaquin next week, Penguin Classics, the canon-focused imprint of Penguin Books, has published "The Woman Who Had Two Navels and Tales of the Tropical Gothic," a new paperback featuring Joaquin's best known stories.

It marks the first time Penguin Classics released a collection of the Filipino writer's seminal works, having already introduced Jose Rizal and Jose Garcia Villa to an international audience.

It includes both the titular stories, as well as "May Day Eve," "The Summer Solstice," and "A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino. "

The collection has been included in BBC's "Ten Books To Read in April" list, and was praised by American science fiction and fantasy author Genevieve Valentine in her review.

Valentine said the book is a "perfect starting point to get to know [Joaquin's] particular brand of melancholy," adding that it was a "transporting read, and a fierce elegy for a past that never was."

"The Woman Who Had Two Navels and Tales of the Tropical Gothic" is available at both National Bookstore and Fully Booked.

Joaquin died in 2004.

The Cultural Center of the Philippines will be highlighting his life in an exhibit on May 4, which is free and open to the public.