Description
Praise
About the Editor

A 10-year-old struggles with what filial piety entails.
A secretary is asked to take over her takeover boss.
Two seekers brave a storm for the world’s best Hainanese chicken rice.

Crossings: The Best Hainanese Chicken Rice And Other Life Dilemmas gathers 12 tales of ordinary people thrust into predicaments, often of their own making. At these critical crossings, their choices can reshape their futures in unexpected and irreversible ways. Though the short stories are bookended by events in a café, they traverse a wide array of settings: from a judge’s sombre chambers to the perilous rooftop of a mansion and the eerie calm of a cemetery. The characters wrestle with dilemmas such as addiction, prospective partners and personal bankruptcy, offering windows into the complexities of modern life. At the heart of these tales are weighty moral questions, as varied as pro-choice/pro-life, the death penalty, and the tangled threads of social justice. Yet, the characters remain deeply relatable – flawed, driven by their desires, and doing their best to navigate life’s uncertainties. Each story invites reflection on the pivotal crossings we all face. They remind us that even the smallest action can ripple into unforeseen consequences – sometimes quietly, sometimes explosively.
“Riveting. I just can’t put the book down.”
—Professor Lim Soo Ping, Bestselling Author

“A master storyteller. Twelve short stories with humour, heart, wit and unexpected twists.”
—Lee Suan Hiang, Former CEO, National Arts Council

“Well-crafted. Willie looks fearlessly at life on our little Red Dot.”
—Meira Chand, Recipient, 2023 Cultural Medallion

“Clear and crisp. Chockfull of urban dilemmas that scale the gamut of genres.”
—Yong Shu Hoong, Winner, 2024 Singapore Literature Prize (English Poetry)

“Delicious. Each story is bitter-sweet.”
—George Yeo, Former Minister for Foreign Affairs
Willie Cheng is an accidental author. During his career in management consulting, his writing focused mainly on business proposals and reports. Upon retirement, he became actively engaged with charities and corporate boards, sparking his interest in the interplay between the social and business sectors. He began to explore and write about the differences between the two domains and how governance could enhance and bridge them. This led to several non-fiction works on corporate governance and the social ecosystem, most notably the Doing Good book series. Crossings: The Best Hainanese Chicken Rice and Other Life Dilemmas marks his fiction debut. The book blends social and moral issues with scenarios that examine human behaviour at its extremes. These stories are framed by a fictionalised account of Crossings Café, a social enterprise he co-founded.

Authors

Crossings: The Best Hainanese Chicken Rice And Other Life Dilemmas