Miguel Syjuco’s Ilustrado is all the rage lately. So are giveaways!

After buying The Dark Knight Returns, I thought I’d stay in the store for a little while longer last night and browse the non-graphic novel shelves. As a habitué of the store, I had practically memorized what books are in a particular aisle and can quickly spot the new arrivals therein—save for the shelves in the large-format section, which is home to books whose size and price more often than not keep me at bay. But for some reason I found myself taking a look at the books in said section last night and was surprised to see a copy of the Picador edition of Ilustrado (pictured right). The brilliant cover by Jon Gray, who also designed the cover of the smaller, cheaper, and more common Farrar, Straus and Giroux edition (left), a copy of which I had purchased several weeks back, caught me off guard. As much a collector of book covers as a collector of books, I bought it right there and then.

Now, I have two copies of the novel, and I’m giving one of them (the smaller and cheaper one) away. Similar to the tiny set of rules I specified for my first book giveaway half a year ago, all you have to do to win is to like, reblog, or reply to this post. Also, lest I risk ponying up a ridiculous amount of money for international shipping, you need to be a resident of the Republic of the Philippines to qualify. The winner will be determined via random draw on May 30, 2010.

So what are you waiting for? Hit that heart button or buzz in with your thoughts and be one step closer to being enlightened.

But wait! There’s more! If you want to earn an additionally entry for the draw, just photo reply to this post with your favorite book cover design. I expect to see more works by Jon Gray and maybe a little bit of Milan Bozic, Peter Mendelsuhn, David Pearson, and Chip Kidd, but I bet I’ll be delighted at your choices all the same.

Ilustrado, by the way, is Syjuco’s debut novel. He won the Man Asian Literary Prize and the Palanca Award in 2008 for the manuscript of Ilustrado. Syjuco was born in the Philippines and currently lives in Montreal. He is therefore ineligible to join this giveaway.