Here at Stories About Stories, authors talk about what goes on behind their latest creation. This week, we're talking to Lau Siew Mei, whose new book The Last Immigrant is finally out! In The Last Immigrant, Ismael, a transplanted Singaporean, lives on a bucolic suburban Brisbane street. His job is to decide whether asylum-seekers get to stay in the country, a dilemma that never fails to remind him of his own immigrant status.
This time around, we have Darren C. Ong, whose children's book, The Trampolines that Nadia Built, has just been released.
He's not your regular author. In fact, he's an associate professor of mathematics at Xiamen University Malaysia. His day job involves doing research on mathematical physics, and how quantum particles behave in environments with an unusual structure.
We got him to spill the beans on trampolines, dreams and lessons learnt.
Vivian Teo was a financial journalist before switching to writing articles for parenting websites such as Sassy Mama and The New Age Parents; as well as her own blog, "The Stuff Childhoods are Made of", where she shares her own tips for parenting, and reviews and recommendations for local family-friendly attractions.
Now, she makes her first foray as an author.
My BFF is an Alien is the first in a four-book series, and it's a lively action-packed adventure that celebrates the bonds of friendship. Schoolgirls Abriana and Octavia have been assigned to be class buddies, but there's something different about Octavia. Abriana finds herself going headlong into quest that could mean life or death for Octavia.
So make yourselves comfortable, grab a cup of tea and dive into the fantastic world of My BFF is an Alien—it's a tale that is, literally, out of this world.
Six years ago, a young boy was called to work the case when Auntie Kim Lian’s precious Peranakan cookbook disappears. Now, many adventures later, Sherlock Sam, his robot Watson and his friends (who make up the Supper Club) are back to solve another mystery. In Kampong Glam no less! Will they be able to catch the crooks?
We're not telling, but we got the creators of Sherlock Sam, A.J. Low—aka the husband-and-wife writing team Adan Jimenez and Felicia Low-Jimenez—to spill the beans (or at least, we tried).
Like any parent out there, children’s book author Linda Locke has her fair share of adorable encounters with her child – so much so that she turned her own parenting experiences into the Jack is Curious book series.
In these books, Linda turned questions posed by her inquisitive son into engaging stories revolving around little Jack and his Mama. Linda creates a sense of familiarity and relatability – a shared experience – among parents who have faced the challenges of helping their child understand the world around them.
The fourth book in the series, Do Farts Make Old People Go Faster? is no different, as Linda tackles another head-scratcher her son asked when he was still a little boy.
The latest collection of short fiction to grace our shelves is Best New Singaporean Short Stories Volume Four, or to give it its full title, The Epigram Books Collection of Best New Singaporean Short Stories Volume Four. (Or as we like to call it in the office, BNSSS4.)
This latest volume was guest-edited by none other Pooja Nansi, the poet and educator who's also the current festival director for the Singapore Writers Festival. Overseeing the volume is none other than the series editor Jason Erik Lundberg, who has helmed this series since the first volume back in 2013. Here, the two of them share their experiences embracing the best short fiction our Lion City has to offer.
Jason Erik Lundberg has been involved in publishing Singlit stories for more than a decade, whether it's short fiction, children's stories or novels. As the fiction editor at Epigram, he has helped authors with their noteworthy novels, from The Gatekeeper to Impractical Uses of Cake.
He also created a children's book series, Bo Bo and Cha Cha, and helmed two anthology series of short fiction, LONTAR and Best New Singaporean Short Stories.
In 2019, he returned to his first love as a writer. His novella, Diary of One Who Disappeared, was released earlier in the year and he played series editor again for the fourth volume of Best New Singaporean Short Stories. And he has a novel prepped for next year!
But for now, we talk to him about his newest release, the compilation of short stories called Most Excellent and Lamentable. Here's what he had to say...
What do a couple whose cat leaves offerings of dead birds; a foreign Bangladeshi worker reawakening his musical longings while constructing a concert hall in Singapore; and a woman craving for croissants, only to find they don't exist, have in common?
They're all featured in The Angel Tiger and Other Stories, a collection of short fiction written by Barrie Sherwood. A Hong Kong native of Canadian and French heritage, he now lives in Singapore and is the assistant professor in the School of Humanities at Nanyang Technological University. Here, he shares about The Anger Tiger and Other Stories, his debut short collection.
Ken Kwek may be better known as a film director, but the truth is that he has been writing stories for a long time — whether it's writing movie scripts or screenplays or plays.
With Timothy and The Phubbers, Ken Kwek makes his official debut as an author. Like the stories he's told on the big screen, the characters in his books are just as colourful.
