Neighbors: A Suicide and Making Choices or How to Turn Your Story into the Right Story

I learned firsthand when my neighbor committed suicide (the neighbor who inspired my short story “Neighbours” that featured the gossip Mrs. Koh (“Are You Mrs. Koh?”):  When someone dies, people will ask how did they die?  When someone commits suicide, people will tell you why… 

While reposting the new link to “Neighbours”, I got to thinking why I wrote the original story, why I chose to focus on that aspect of the story and not the whole story.  I first touched upon this in an old blog (later published in Tropical Affairs) that I posted soon after “Neighbors” (using the American spelling) had been accepted for publication in the American literary journal Thema — twenty years after I first wrote the story for a Malaysian contest. The story, from Lovers and Strangers Revisited, was later taught for six years (2008-2014) in SPM literature and in various private colleges and universities throughout Malaysia, and translated into French along with the rest of the collection.

          

This is the updated version of what I wrote:

Writing, I used to tell my students, is about making choices.  If you choose wisely you might surprise yourself with the story you end up with.  For example in “Neighbors”, I could’ve written a nonfiction narrative or a different story starting with my hearing some groans coming from my neighbor’s house, two doors away.  When I investigated, I found an elderly Chinese man lying helpless on the couch.  His door was locked, yet in between moaning he managed to tell me that the keys were by the sink, which I was able to obtain by reaching through the grille at the kitchen window.  With the help of another Chinese neighbor (whose wife was pregnant and very upset that he was getting involved), we took him to the General Hospital.

I could’ve written about the hospital’s reaction to me, a young white man attending to this elderly Chinese man who was dying, their giving me strange looks as I wrote in my journal, trying to get all the details and my impressions while they were still fresh — the writer part of me at work; and then my anger at the doctors and nurses who seemed indifferent about my neighbor’s plight.  He was dying and no one wanted to help!

Since the doctors didn’t know what poison he had taken, I volunteered to go back to his house. Although I often chatted with this neighbor across the gate or his fence, I had never ventured inside his house.  I could’ve written about the eerie feeling I had wandering inside this empty house where a man had just tried to kill himself.  Upstairs I located two glasses of beer and some green liquid, which I took to the hospital.

Since this was in the mid-80s before CSI, the doctors wanted me to go back to the house once more to find out what the green stuff was.  So back I went and eventually found, hidden behind a partition, a bottle of the weed killer, Paraquat. By then there was nothing the doctors could do, so I stayed with this man for several hours at the hospital, while we tried, without success, to contact his family.  I didn’t want him to die alone like another expat that I wrote about who had died alone in a faraway land.

I could’ve written about my attending the three-day Chinese (Teochew) funeral held outside their house, which was very lively and noisy and attracted a lot of attention from the other Chinese neighbors.  When it was over, I was invited back to the house and given a gift, a token of appreciation for what I had done for this family.

The family, however, refused to live in the house anymore because of this suicide.  Months later, another family had moved in, but they kept hearing mysterious noises — like someone walking around upstairs in the master bedroom — and it was scaring the children.  The family didn’t know about the suicide until after they had decided to leave.  Malaysians, particularly the Chinese, take ghosts and spirits very seriously.

None of this mattered to the story that I wanted to write.  For me the story began when I returned from the hospital to the man’s house and found several neighbors gossiping.

I was fascinated by all of the comments the neighbors made, the wild speculations about the family and why the man had taken his life.  Some of the things they had said were mean and spiteful.  Later, when the man’s wife and daughter returned home, the neighbors quickly dispersed; they refused to inform them about the man’s death.  Even though I was the newest neighbor and an expat, I had to bear the bad tidings alone.

This was the story that fascinated me.  The story I wanted to tell was not a first person narrative of my finding this man and all that took place that day (although I could still write about it since it’s in my journal as either non-fiction or incorporate it into another story or as part of a novel — it’s all there to be used, grist for the mill as writers often say). 

Instead, I chose to write about the neighbors them­selves and what they said about this family in the aftermath of the suicide.  In fact ‘Aftermath’ was the original title when it was first published in Singapore and Australia and in Lovers and Strangers (Heinemann Asia, 1993).  Again thanks to my journal, all the details were there, still fresh, including those that had completely slipped my memory after several years had already passed, one of the reasons I urged my writing students to keep a diary/journal.

Another choice I made was to leave me, as a character, out of the story.  I felt it would be better without a Westerner or a mat salleh in it.  I wanted the dialogue to be natural, spontaneous, and an expat present would alter the dynamics of the group, including the dialogue.  Also I wanted to shift the sympathy to this man and his family — even after hearing many bad things about them.  

I purposely wrote the story in a neutral tone with the viewpoint of an observer, to avoid racial bias, so no one race in this multi-racial society is talking down to another. Yet, at the same time, all Malaysians should be able to identify with these characters.  They could be your very own neighbor or a relative, hopefully distant....I wanted to make the story universal, so readers around the world could relate to the characters and also learn about Malaysia, where different races freely mix and socialize, and yes, gossip.

When writing your story, whether it is based on a true dramatic incident or nor, or whether it is fiction or nonfiction, ask yourself, do you want to write the whole story or just one aspect of that story?  Consider your choices carefully.  I did and thirty years later the story keeps paying off in unforeseen ways.

Then again, it is always hard to keep a good story down, especially when it involves a suicide and neighbors gossiping.  At times, we all love a good gossip.  Just ask Mrs. Koh.

                                                            #  #  #

Later I had blogged about the significant changes that I made in *“Neighbours” that led to its initial publication, and the subsequent revisions for publications overseas and in various book forms (three publishers and a French translation), which I noted in the series The Story Behind the Story, used by teachers as an aide for their students.  MELTA (Malaysia English Language Teaching Association) had even created an on-line discus­sion for “Neighbours” for students and teachers on their literature forum, which had over 20,500 hits and 30 pages of comments about the story and Mrs. Koh before it was archived and later take down.

*The link to the short story “Neighbours”  is the revised version, written in the present tense, after the French translation of Lovers and Strangers Revisited came out.

**Here is link to a recent Google Meet with students at UiTM-Penang during a Q-and-A session about "Neighbours" and the motivation of the various characters and why I ended the story where I did. 

         —Borneo Expat Writer

"Neighbours" by Robert Raymer

Thirty-two years after I wrote “Neighbours”, after it was first published in The Star as consolation winner in their national short story contest, it is still being taught now and then, most recently at UITM (as of 2020).  Published in the USA, Australia, Singapore and Malaysia, the story had been taught in Malaysia secondary schools for six year for STM literature and at numerous private and public universities and colleges throughout the country.

I'm posting this to replace the one from an old website since it is no longer available and I had over a dozen links to the story in various "Neighbour" related blogs.  This is the revised version, after the French translation of Lovers and Strangers Revisited.  (Revised it again in December 2023).

NEIGHBOURS

by

 Robert Raymer

        

        

         “I suppose there’s a mess in the back seat,” Mrs. Koh says, her face flushed, her arms crossed as she stands in front of Johnny Leong’s terrace house.  She shakes her head and waits impatiently for Koh and Tan to get out of the car.  “You had to volunteer our new car, didn’t you?  Why didn’t you borrow someone else’s car like I told you, or wait for an ambu­­lance?  Now it’s ruined.  Ruined!”

         Koh doesn’t bother to respond, his attention drawn to the mournful sound of someone playing the saxophone.  He stretches and rubs his aching back.

         Koh and Tan are Johnny’s immediate neighbors.  The Koh’s terrace house is on the left, while Tan, a bachelor, lives on the right.  The medium-income housing area is new, less than two years old.  Malays, Chinese and Indians live together in relative harmony—a mini Malay­sia.  The streets are narrow, though, with no sidewalks to walk on because of the un­­cov­ered mon­soon drains.  Neighbors must walk on the street where they also stop and chat, moving aside to let an occasional car pass by.

         Across the street, Miss Chee, a sec­ondary school teacher, slender with short black hair and razor-sharp bangs, unlocks her gate and lets out her white Pomeranian.  Up­on noticing Mr. and Mrs. Koh standing in front of Leong’s gate, she waves and crosses the street to join them.  She realizes that Tan, the new math teacher at Penang Free School, is with them.  She blushes, but it’s too late to turn back or he may think she’s avoiding him or being rude.

         Mrs. Koh, peering through the car side window, doesn’t see a mess, although she’s con­vinced the evidence is just waiting for her to find.  She looks up to see Miss Chee approach­ing.  Before anyone has a chance to speak, Mrs. Koh blurts out, “Hear about John­ny?”

         Taken aback, Miss Chee asks a bit nervously, “Were he and Veronica fighting again?”

         Mrs. Koh’s beady eyes light up like shiny new coins.  “Did you hear them fighting this morning?”  She turns to her husband with an I-told-you-so look on her face.

         “Wait a minute, were they fighting?” Tan asks, glancing at Koh.

         “No, they weren’t fighting,” Koh says, glaring at his wife.  “I told you that already.  I was outside all morning, and I would’ve heard them.”

         “I didn’t think so,” Tan says, adjusting his glasses.  “When Veronica and Lily stepped outside, they seemed perfectly fine.  In fact, they smiled and waved like they normally do.”

         Mrs. Koh twitches her nose.  “Veronica didn’t say where they were going, did she?  Gambling, that’s where!  Every Sunday she plays mahjong and I’m sure she’s in debt!”  She pauses to catch their surprised reaction.  To prove her point, she adds, “She once tried to bor­row money from Koh.”

         “She only wanted five ringgit-lah, to buy some vegetables,” Koh says, shaking his head.  “She didn’t have time to go to the bank.”

         “You’re not her bank either!  Otherwise, she’d be borrowing from you all the time,” Mrs. Koh says.  “Thank heavens you didn’t give her any.”

         “You wouldn’t let me,” he says, “and she’s our neighbor!”

         “It’s bad enough she’s always collecting advance money for her meals, and now that Johnny’s dead—”

         Miss Chee’s mouth drops open.  “Dead?”

         “He’s not dead yet,” Koh says to his wife.  “He’s still breathing.”

         “Dead?  Still breathing?”  Miss Chee’s mouth goes slack as she looks from Koh to Tan for some answers.

         “He’s as good as dead,” Mrs. Koh snaps.

         Miss Chee gasps in frustration, “I don’t understand…who?  Who are you talking about?  Johnny?  Is he all right?”

         “All right?  He’s all wrong,” Mrs. Koh says.  “Him and his whole family!”

         “Johnny tried to commit suicide this morning,” Koh explains to Miss Chee.

         “Wah!  But why?”

         “Because Veronica ran up all those gambling debts!” Mrs. Koh says.

         Koh glowers at his wife.  “We don’t know that.  We do know he drank weed-killer.  He was drinking it with his beer.”

         Mrs. Koh plants her hands squarely on her hips.  “Drinking!  That’s all that man did—sit around and drink.  And that—that Veronica!  The way she lets that daughter of hers run around like some tramp!”

         Miss Chee’s eyes open wide.  “Lily?  She’s an all-A student.”  She leans toward Tan and says in a low voice, “Lily is my best student.”

         Tan nods and smiles at her politely.  Again, he adjusts his glasses even though they seem perfectly fine.

         Miss Chee hesitates, but then asks Tan, “When did you find Johnny?”

         “Just before noon,” Koh replies.  “Isn’t that right, Tan?”

         “Yes, about noon.”

         Mrs. Koh nods.  “Koh told me he heard Johnny groaning one hour after Veronica took Lily gambling.  I just happened to look at my watch when they passed by.”

         “I didn’t hear the groaning until after Tan called me from his gate,” Koh says, giving a salute to Tan.  “If it wasn’t for Tan, Johnny might already be dead.”

         “And you had to put him in our brand new car!” Mrs. Koh says.  “Just imagine if he died there.  All the bad luck it’d bring, and with the New Year just around the corner!  We’d have to sell it, and it’s not even two months old!”

 

         Dr. Nathan, an Indian dentist who lives next door to Miss Chee, waves at them from his car window as he slows down.  He stops in front of his gate, gets out and un­locks it be­fore driving in­side.  Instead of closing and locking his gate, he waves and crosses the street to join them.  He extends his hand to Koh, one of his patients.
         “A fine Sunday afternoon,” Nathan says.

         “Not for Johnny,” Mrs. Koh replies.  “He’s dead.”

         “Alamak!”

         “He’s not dead yet,” Koh says, shaking Nathan’s hand.  “Tan and I just took Johnny to the General Hospital.  He tried to commit suicide by drinking Paraquat.  We finally man­aged to contact his son, and he’s over there now.  Veronica and Lily haven’t been told yet.  We don’t know how to contact them.”

         “For heaven’s sake,” Nathan says, and looks as if he just pulled the wrong tooth.  “I nev­er realized.  Just last New Year—yes, it was just last New Year Johnny had that party and every­one was there…having a grand time.”

         “Especially Koh,” Mrs. Koh says, eyeing him.  “He was so drunk I had to drag him home.”

         “I was not drunk!  I was celebrating!”

         “Celebrating, ha!  That’s what you call it!  You had a hangover and missed work for two days!”

         “I was on annual leave,” Koh corrects.

         “Same thing.  You missed work!”

         Nathan rubs his balding head and asks, “Who found Johnny?”

         Miss Chee nods at Tan and says, “Mr. Tan did.  He heard Johnny groaning.”

         “I can’t take all the credit, Miss Chee.  Your name is Miss Chee, am I correct?”

         “Why yes…it is,” Miss Chee replies, her smile widening.  “My friends call me Alice.”

         “My friends and my patients call me Nathan.”  He offers his hand to Tan, who in­tro­duces himself.

         “Anyway, it was Koh who went inside the house first,” Tan said.  “And he called the am­bulance.”

          “But we decided not to wait,” Koh says.  “The hospital kept asking all these foolish questions that we couldn’t answer, so we took him in ourselves.”

         “In our BRAND NEW CAR!” Mrs. Koh says.

         “You have a new car.  I never realized,” Nathan says.  “I remember my first new car, a Proton Saga—the very year it came out, mind you.  Our national car.  We’ve cer­tainly come a long way since Independence, haven’t we?”  Nathan’s smile over­flows with pride.  “Now John­ny, he was a good neighbor.  Yes, a good neighbor, even though he owes me for treat­ment.  Root canals aren’t cheap, you know.”

         “That reminds me,” Koh says, “my tooth has been hurting again.”

         “Oh, dear,” Nathan says.  “You mustn’t wait, or you could find yourself in a lot of pain.  That’s what happened to Johnny.  He waited until the pain was simply unbearable.” 

         “Should I call your office for an appointment or just drop by?”

         Two passing motorcycles drown out Nathan’s reply.

         Miss Chee’s dog barks, feigning chase; after a few frantic steps, it returns to Miss Chee.

         “Ramli’s kids!” Mrs. Koh says, staring down the street after them.  “Race here, race there.  Last week I saw one of them teaching Lily how to ride.  I don’t know why Veron­ica lets her daughter—at that age—run around with boys.  I’d never let my daughter do that!  And today, of all days, she takes Lily gambling!”

         Nathan scratches an ear.  “Oh dear, I never realized Veronica gambles.”

         Mrs. Koh is nodding.  “Every Sunday she goes to her cousin’s house in Air Itam.  That’s where she gambles!  Every Sunday!”

         “You told me you had no idea where Veronica went,” Koh says, annoyed, frowning at his wife.  “Johnny’s son was trying to reach her.”

         Mrs. Koh crosses her arms in defiance.  “It’s none of my business where she gambles!”

         “You should never gamble with your teeth,” Nathan says to Tan, and passes him a busi­ness card.  “If you ever need a reliable dentist, I live right across the street.  You can’t get more reliable than a neighbor.”

         Ramli, an elderly Malay, his back ramrod straight, sells satay at the night markets.  He walks in the mid­dle of the street and nods to Tan, one of his regular customers.

         “My eldest daughter tells me Johnny hasn’t been at school the past three days,” Ramli says.  “Then yesterday she saw him walking along the main road carrying a helmet without his motorcycle.  Imagine that!”

         Miss Chee asks Tan in a low voice, “Is Johnny a teacher?”

         “No,” Tan replies, “he’s a janitor at my school.”

         “A dead janitor,” Mrs. Koh says.

         “Dead?  Don’t talk about dead.  No joke-lah!” Ramli gazes from face to face as if he missed the punch line to a sick joke, though hoping some­one will explain it to him.  “So, who’s dead?  Huh?”

         “Johnny, but he’s not quite dead—at least not yet,” Koh says.  “But he did try to kill himself by drinking Paraquat.”

         “Paraquat?  Ya Allah!”  Ramli’s dark brown eyes roll upwards toward heaven.

         “Koh heard him groaning around noon,” Mrs. Koh says.  “One hour after Veronica took Lily gambling.”

         “Wasn’t it Tan who heard the groaning?”  Miss Chee glances at Tan for con­firma­tion.

         Koh nods.  “That’s right.  If it wasn’t for Tan, Johnny might already be dead.”

         “It has to be about money-lah,” Ramli says to no one in particular.

         Everyone looks at him.

         “Why else would he sell his motorcycle?”

         “He’s right-lah,” Koh says.  “Why else?”

         “I bet it’s because he’s involved with another woman!” Mrs. Koh says.  “Wouldn’t sur­prise me!  He might even have a second family!  Imagine that!”

         Tan and Ramli glance doubtfully at one another.  They shrug, suggesting that it’s pos­si­ble.

         “Gambling, drinking, womanizing—what a family!  And broke!” Mrs. Koh says.

         “Now I’ll never get that root canal bill paid,” Nathan says, and grimaces.

         “I’m sure Johnny has some insurance somewhere,” Tan says, trying to be helpful. 

         Koh frowns as if he just discovered dog poop stuck to the bottom of his shoe.

         “Well if he does, he didn’t buy it from me,” Koh says.  “I must’ve asked him a half doz­en times.  What good did it do me?  And I’m his neighbor!”

         “My elder son offered to buy Johnny’s motor­cycle for its license plate number for good money, too,” Ramli says.  “Now look at what he did, sold it to a stranger!”

         Miss Chee watches her dog go back and forth across the street.  She sighs in exaspera­tion.  “It’s a good thing Veronica has that catering business to fall back on, if worst comes to worst.”  She catches Tan’s gaze.  “Are you buying from her?”

         “Well, no, not yet,” Tan replies, “but I was thinking about it.”

         “It must be difficult living on your own like that.”

         “I’ve been living on my own for fifteen years,” Nathan says, “and I can cook, too.” 

         Miss Chee smiles politely.  “Now if Johnny doesn’t make it—”        

         “He won’t if he drank Paraquat,” Ramli says.  “That one’s a sure killer.”

         “Either way,” Miss Chee says, “I’m sure the good Lord will look after Veronica and Lily.”

         Tan asks, “Are they Christian?”

         “He has a Christian name, doesn’t he!” Mrs. Koh says, pointing out the obvious.  “So does Veronica and Lily!”

         “Come to think of it,” Koh says, scratching his head, “I don’t think they are.  In fact, I think they’re Buddhists.  Or used to be.  With Johnny, you can never tell.  Besides, back in school many of us added Christian names but we weren’t Christian.  Even you did, long be­fore you converted.”

         “That doesn’t make it right,” Mrs. Koh says.  “It’s misleading!”

         Tan says, “Unless I’m mistaken, Johnny once told me he was a free-thinker.”

         Koh chuckles.  “That’s Johnny for you.  Since he works at Penang Free School, he likes everything free.”  He laughs at his own joke.

         “You should know,” Mrs. Koh says, “you’re always there drinking his free beer.”

         “You’re just jealous that Johnny never invites you over.”

         “I wouldn’t go even if Johnny and Veronica begged me.”

         Tan gazes at the round concrete table and stools not far from Johnny’s gate.  He clears his voice and says to Miss Chee, “We used to sit there and talk.  The very night I moved in—even though I was a total stranger—Johnny invited me over.  We must’ve sat up half the night philosophizing about everything under the sun.”  Guilt creeps into his eyes.  “Just last night I was over there.”

         “I saw you.”  Miss Chee blushes as Tan looks at her with surprise.  “I happened to glance down from my bedroom window.”

         Tan gazes at the window, then at Miss Chee.  “I think Johnny was just lonely.”

         “You think he’s lonely?” Nathan says.  “My wife has been dead fifteen years.  Fifteen years!  Johnny can’t be lonely, not with a wife and daughter at home.  And his son comes visit­ing often enough.”

         “Johnny has a son?”  Ramli ponders this.  “I thought he only has a daughter.”

         “Danny’s his name,” Miss Chee says.  “He was one of my first students.  A bright student at that.”

         “Yes, we had a long talk at that New Year party,” Nathan says.  “Danny’s a good boy with a good job.”

         “Good boy, ha!” Mrs. Koh says.  “Ever since he became a big shot at the bank, he cer­tain­ly acts like one—living in town and wasting money paying extra rent.  What for?  A good boy would stay at home and help his father pay the bills, especially the way Veronica gam­bles and throws away money on Lily.  Always buying her the latest styles.”

         “At least Veronica works,” Koh says.

         Mrs. Koh twitches her nose.  “Her food isn’t much to talk about.  So bland!  And she’s always asking for advance money.  Why can’t her son give her some of his money?  Huh?”

         “I wish my elder two sons would settle down and find good jobs like that,” Ramli says.  “Before I was twenty, I had a job, a house and a wife!  Back in those days, boys had more res­ponsibilities.”

         “It sure would be nice if your sons stopped racing up and down the street,” Mrs. Koh says.  “The noise is deafening!”

         “See!  See!  That’s what happens when grown boys stay at home!” Ramli says, raising his arms in surrender.  “They get restless!  Only a wife will settle them down.  A wife and a job will teach them some responsi­bil­ities.  If you ask me, Johnny had it too easy.  Too easy.  He has a working wife and only two children.  One living on his own at that.  Look at me, six of them, and a mother-in law at home!  You don’t see me com­­mitting suicide, do you?”

         Mrs. Koh stares past Nathan’s shoulder to one of the houses further up the street. “Who’s playing that—that thing, anyway?”

         “It’s a saxophone,” Koh says.  He fingers his mole hair and listens more closely.

         Mrs. Koh says, “People shouldn’t play those things unless they already know how!”

         “If he doesn’t practice,” Koh says, “how can he know how?  When I was a boy, I had an old trumpet and would practice all day.”

         Koh smiles to himself and closes his eyes, re­mem­ber­ing.

         Ramli strains his neck to see around the others.  “Look, here comes Veronica.” 

         All of them turn to look.

         Veronica and Lily are walking side by side, each carrying several plastic bags.

         Koh turns to his wife.  “Looks like they didn’t go gambling, only shop­ping.”

         Mrs. Koh twitches her nose in defiance and peers around their car to get a better look.

         Miss Chee asks, “Think she knows about Johnny?”

         Mrs. Koh shakes her head.  “I bet she was too busy spending all her money on that daugh­­ter of hers to know anything.”

         “If you ask me,” Ramli says, “Johnny had it too easy.  Too easy.”

         “I hope they don’t move,” Miss Chee says.  “Lily is my best student.”

         “Don’t even mention it,” Nathan says, “or I’ll lose two more patients.”

         “Of course they’ll move,” Mrs. Koh says.  “Wouldn’t you move if your husband com­mits suicide in your own home?”

         “I’m not married,” Miss Chee replies, glancing at Tan.

         “Hey, what time is it?” Koh asks.  “There’s a football match I want to watch!”

         “Oh my, it’s going on one,” Nathan says, glancing at the time.  “I haven’t had my lunch yet.  No wonder I feel hungry.”

         “I got to run-lah,” Koh says, and hurries next door.

         Tan asks, “Who’s going to tell Veronica?”

         Miss Chee looks down at her dog, and Ramli and Nathan both shrug as they return to their respective terrace houses.

         “Not me,” Mrs. Koh says, anxious to leave before Veronica and Lily arrive at their gate.  “It’s none of my business.”

#  #  #

*Here is link to a recent Google Meet with students at UiTM-Penang during a Q-and-A session about "Neighbours" and the motivation of the various characters and why I ended the story where I did. 

**“Neighbours:The Story Behind the Story.  

***Neighbors:  A Suicide and Making Choices or How to Turn Your Story into the Right Story 

Trust the Novel Writing (and rewriting) Process. 

My interview with Chuah Guat Eng is in Blue Lotus 16

My interview with Chuah Guat Eng, author of Echoes of Silence and Days of Change, is in Blue Lotus 16, 2019, pages 8-25.  Originally I had blogged about our interview in October 2018. 

My other interviews with Preeta Samarasan, author of Evening is the Whole Day, was published in Blue Lotus 12, Ivy Ngeow, Cry of the Flying Rhino, in Blue Lotus 13 and Golda Mowe, author of Iban Dream and Iban Journey, in Blue Lotus 15 

Links to the other blog interviews with first novelists: 

Ivy Ngeow author of Cry of the Flying Rhino, winner of the 2016 Proverse Prize.

Golda Mowe author of Iban Dream and Iban Journey.

Preeta Samarasan author of Evening is the Whole Day.

Also, Malachi Edwin Vethamani, author of Complicated Lives and Life Happens.

Five part Maugham and Me series

—Borneo Expat Writer

My interview with Golda Mowe is in Blue Lotus 15

My interview with Golda Mowe, author of Iban Dreams and Iban Journey, and the new sequel Iban Woman, is in Blue Lotus 15, 2018, pages 8-21.  Originally I had blogged about our interview in 2017.

My other interviews with Preeta Samarasan, author of Evening is the Whole Day, was published in Blue Lotus 12 and Ivy Ngeow, Cry of the Flying Rhino, in Blue Lotus 13.

Other interviews with first novelists include: 

Chuah Guat Eng,  author of Echoes of Silence and Days of Change. 

Along with: 

Ivy Ngeow author of Cry of the Flying Rhino, winner of the 2016 Proverse Prize.

Golda Mowe author of Iban Dream and Iban Journey.

Preeta Samarasan author of Evening is the Whole Day. 

Also, Malachi Edwin Vethamani, author of Complicated Lives and Life Happens.

Five part Maugham and Me series

—Borneo Expat Writer