Geronima (Hero) De Vera

Geronima De Vera was born into a wealthy Ilocano family in Vigan, one of the oldest Spanish colonial cities in the Philippines. She is known to her family and friends as Nimang. Inspired by her uncle Pol, she goes to medical school to become a surgeon like him. During her first year at the University of Santo Tomas she is recruited by Teresa and Eddie to join the New People’s Army, a communist guerilla rebel group that resisted martial law, as imposed by Marcos in 1972, and the established government. She drops out of university and becomes a field doctor for the NPA in 1976 when she is 20 years old. She spends the next 10 years in the mountains of Isabela, treating people who come back from raids and missions injured.

She is captured and spends two years in a prisoner camp, where she is tortured and...