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Winner of the 2019 Singapore Book Awards Best Book Cover Design

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Meet the four misfits living in one HDB flat.

One is a Malay–Jew who is trying to get his father to come back as a ghost. Cantona is a promising Bangladeshi artist on the run from a construction company.Tights is a Chinese illegal immigrant with a Forrest Gump obsession. And Shanti is a gifted Indian lab technician hiding from her abusive husband.

When a forlorn pontianak begins haunting them, the four friends find themselves embroiled in a surreal showdown that may just upend the world, or at least Singapore.

Written in Suffian Hakim's trademark humour, The Minorities is a novel about those living on the edges of society and their soulful bond.
“Suffian "brings his brand of salt-of-the-earth humour and wordplay" to The Minorities.”
—The Straits Times

“Undoubtedly one of the most whimsical, creative and unpretentious young voices in Singapore literature.”
—The Straits Times

“This is the second novel from the author of the virally successful Hogwarts parody Harris Bin Potter and the Stoned Philosopher, and it’s a blast: a warm-hearted thriller featuring a half-Malay Muslim half-Jewish Chinese inventor, a Singaporean Indian scientist-cum-domestic-abuse survivor, a Bangladeshi artist-cum-runaway construction worker, and a mainland Chinese superhero wannabe with special needs...oh, and a pontianak, all living together in an HDB flat, chasing dreams and eating waffles and eluding the forces that are out to get them. Like its predecessor, it’s an action-packed spec fic comedy road trip bildungsroman, but it’s got these fascinating political implications: the notion of home and Singapore is configured as a found family of classless refugees, regardless of citizenship and hygiene, both supranational and supernatural. No one else here is writing quite like this.”
—Ng Yi-Sheng, Singapore Literature Prize-winning poet, playwright, journalist, activist and author of Lion City

“Buckle up for a joyful, wild ride in Suffian Hakim’s inimitable terrain of transmigrating pontianaks, telekinetic apparitions and guided group therapy for supernatural beings with issues. You’ll hate yourself for flipping to the last page too quickly.”
—Sebastian Sim, author of Let’s Give it Up for Gimme Lao! and The Riot Act
Suffian Hakim has been hailed as “undoubtedly one of the most whimsical, creative and unpretentious young voices in Singapore literature” by The Straits Times. Suffian is a writer at Big 3 Media. He was previously a regional content lead at media agency GroupM and has written for television shows such as Random Island and The Noose, and for the publications Esquire and August Man.

His second novel, The Minorities, was also published by Epigram in 2018.

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Listen to a podcast with Suffian x Two Book Nerds Talking
Listen to "TBNT S02E11 | LIVE at Lit Books with Suffian Hakim" on Spreaker.

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Horror and Ghost Stories

The Minorities