It’s always an exciting time for a writer when your first novel is
about to be published, but when you have two novels coming out from two separate
publishers — one a prize-winner in Hong Kong, another crowdfunded in London — that’s
really exciting..
Thirty years ago, when Ivy Ngeow was 17, I met her at two-day workshop
in Kuala Lumpur conducted by noted Malaysian author K.S. Maniam. Seventeen years later, as an editor for the
anthology Silverfish 4, I happened to choose one of Ivy’s short stories. I didn’t connect the writer from the UK with
the writer I had met from Johor until she pointed it out to me.
I was fortunate to have read the advance copy of Ivy’s forthcoming
novel, Cry of the Flying Rhino, winner
of the 2016 Proverse Prize, for her Proverse Hong Kong publisher. The book was written in a lyrical style infused with Borneo folklore, Iban dreams, and
peppered with startling fresh similes and metaphors both illuminating and
culturally apt....Ivy has an eye for rich telling detail and a deft ear for
dialogue. I’m looking forward to reading Heart of Glass.
Born and raised in
Johor Bahru, Malaysia and a graduate of the Middlesex University Writing MA
program, Ivy won the 2005 Middlesex University Literary Prize out of nearly
1500 entrants worldwide. Her short
stories have appeared in two Silverfish New Writing anthologies, in Fixi Novo’s
anthology Hungry in Ipoh, The New Writer, and on the BBC World
Service. She won first prize in the Commonwealth
Essay Writing Competition 1994, first prize in the Barnes and Noble Career
Essay Writing competition 1998 and was shortlisted for the David T K Wong
Fellowship 1998 and the Ian St James Award 1999. She even won fifth prize (out of 850 entrants)
in the 2006 1-MIC (Music Industry Charts) UK Award for her original song, ‘Celebrity’.
An architect by profession, Ivy lives and
writes in London with her family.
RR:
I can’t imagine what’s going through your mind right now knowing that your
first and second novels, Cry
of the Flying Rhino and Heart of
Glass, are both coming out in 2017, so please tell us...
IVY: I feel I am being whacked
about the head every morning. I remind
myself that although I have had short stories published, I have put in the five
ingredients of writing a novel: inspiration,
time, effort, commitment and energy.
After many decades, in which at no stage was it easy, another journey
has begun for me—that as a novelist.
RR: About time, I’m sure....I
know the feeling all too well and so do plenty of other writers. You’ve also cleverly managed to bypass that
whole second novel syndrome — two at one time.
Smart! Tell us a little about
each novel, their similarities and differences?
I know one is set in Malaysia. The
other?
IVY: Cry of the Flying Rhino is set in Malaysia and Borneo in the 1990s. The protagonist is a Malaysian Chinese
doctor, a middle-class Western-educated professional. However he is entangled in his wife’s past
secrets and has to disentangle himself and his family. Heart
of Glass is set in Chicago and Macau in the 1980s. The protagonist is a mixed American Chinese
girl, a petty criminal, a school dropout who has to find a way of coming clean
by taking on a gig abroad in Macau. Both
main characters have to find their own sense of belonging; both are decultured
in their own natural settings. The
themes of imprisonment, displacement, cultural identity and diversity are
prevalent in my novels. They are both
slightly gothic literary thrillers taking place in the denseness and darkness
of cities or jungles at night, steeped in rich cultural references and
atmospheric settings.
RR: The settings for Cry of the Flying Rhino were
palpable. I was thinking, when did Ivy
come to Borneo? Why didn’t she visit me! How did crowdfunding Heart of Glass come about?
Was that your idea, the publisher, or is it a new trend that you tapped
into — a compromise between traditional publishing versus self-publishing — a
win-win, I assume, for both the writer and the publisher?
IVY: I first heard of Unbound, a crowdfunding
publisher through a mailing list that I was on and I thought what the hell. I sent them the entire manuscript in October
2016 and they accepted it on 18 November 2016.
The idea behind crowdfunding was simply to pre-sell 175 to 300 copies of
your book through direct sales. I
thought — I can’t do that! I could sell 10. Maybe 20.
But then I asked myself, wait a minute, what if I could sell 175 copies? Would
I not want that? Why don’t I give it a
go? I could always quit if I could not
make the target. Since no one, including
the publisher, knew what could happen in the future, I signed the contract. If I pre-sold the copies, I would have a real
book and an ebook. This was the deal. And it was a top London publisher. I started my crowdfunding campaign on 12
December 2016. The project was fully
funded on 30 March 2017.
From the start I knew
this is the exact opposite of vanity or self-publishing. No self-published book would exist in a real
bookshop even an indie. Unbound’s books
do. It can’t be vanity as it was as
humble as you would ever have to be. You’re
selling your hard work. How to be proud
when you’re selling? And in sales, the
customer must at least feel comfortable to spend his or her hard-earned money
on you. The publisher? Unbound would be editing, designing, copyediting,
proofing, publishing, distributing as per tradition. You? The
writer? You write the book and you sell
the copies. The contract was very
transparent and clear. My contact who I
was dealing with was friendly, helpful and kind. They were always there to answer my questions
or to assist me with the steps I was taking.
On top of that, I had access to the Unbound Social Club, the online forum
of the authors and a treasure trove of experience, sounding boards, tips and
advice.
RR: This all sounds
intriguing — you get a publisher, an in-house support group and a social network,
something you can plug into at any moment, ideal for isolated writers in the
far flung corners of the world like me in Borneo....What are the benefits and
the drawbacks to crowdfunding a novel?
Do you recommend it for other writers?
Would you do it again?
IVY:
Pros:
-publication by a top quality London publisher
via traditional publishing process
-high quality,
professional production
-access to top editorial team and design team
-access to the authors’ forum and network
-gaining wide readership or fans through
campaigning
-gaining new skill of crowdfunding through the
process
-attract media attention, publicity and
promotion
-books distributed widely, or by Penguin if hardback
-authors get 50-50 with publisher (high
royalties) after target reached
Cons:
-crowdfunding is direct
marketing, sales campaign and self-promotion all in one
-not being able to find/reach out to enough
readers/investors/supporters/patrons
-social media over-use
-extremely time consuming
-annoying people you know (to buy your book)
-annoying people you don’t know (to buy your
book)
-risk of not reaching target (shame/embarrassment)
-no advance
-high target
Despite the cons, I would definitely
recommend crowdfunding to new authors who have written a truly original piece
of work or something which straddles genres (like mine) or something that has a
moral heart which is hard to place in the market. For previously published authors crowdfunding
would work well if you have an established readership. There are many well-known authors crowdfunding.
RR: With publishing industry
being what it is today, I’m not surprised.
If a writer can guarantee sales by crowdfunding, it removes a lot of the
risk for the publisher; also the writer will be getting that second chance that
may have eluded them if their first book or early work, for one reason or
another, didn’t sell up to expectations....I was amazed by all these writers
whose books had gone out of print, by how quickly they jumped into the eBook
market. Suddenly they were back in
business, eager to find new readers, putting in the hard work to market
themselves, proving to publishers who let their work go out of print — see, I
knew I had readers out there; they just happened to be scattered around the
world!
Tell us little about your background, growing up in Johor, and what led
you into writing at a young age. Do you
draw upon that experience in your fiction?
IVY: I was born and raised in Johor Bahru. My house overlooks the Straits of Johor. I attended the local Convent school (Holy
Infant Jesus Convent). I was so
fortunate that when we moved into the house where my parents still live, one
room was filled with the previous owner’s books from floor to ceiling. I did not know what these books were, but I
started to read every one of them and by the time I was fourteen I believe I
had read them all. There were classics,
blockbusters, books on religion, biology, science, maths, astronomy, law, and
teaching yourself (French, Yoga, Music, Chinese, Malay, English, Islam,
Christianity, Swahili etc). There was
even a Kama Sutra (I remember being
so horrified as I thought it was yoga!) The
books were very old, dating from the forties to the mid-seventies....I could slip
into the past quite easily; even now I still see myself as a vintage person.
My mother, who was a school teacher,
also brought home six hardback books every week from her school library. She knew I loved humour, mysteries and crime
so she brought home Agatha Christie, P G Wodehouse, Enid Blyton books. There was also the Sultan Ismail library
which I remember my mother took me to join when I was eight or nine.
RR: Lucky you! My parents weren’t readers, so we had zero
books at home. My grandmother, who went
to college but my parents didn’t, had a thick children book that I learned to
read. Luckily we had a library next door
to one of my primary schools (we moved a lot) and a decent library in junior
and senior high school and my older brother had books assigned to him in
college that I would read. But I was
never a voracious reader and envied those who had cultivated that wonderful
habit. I didn’t start reading on a regular
basis until I backpacked through Europe after university — I would swap books
with other backpackers. Nor did I start
to write until my mid-twenties.
IVY: I started writing really young. This is pretty much the perfect age to begin
living in an imaginary world. Initially
it was to entertain my toddler brothers because they were bored with the
stories they had heard (so was I), so I started writing down stories that I
made up. I found it quite entertaining....I
sort of cared and did not care if they liked my stories or not. My only reader was my dad. He was a doctor and quite a serious critical
thinker. He would read them and give me
feedback on plot or character weaknesses and I remember that I went back to
fix the grammar or spelling, but not to improve or change the stories because
I just wanted to start a new one. The
door to many other worlds opened when I discovered reading and, from then on, I
really did not want to look back or to stop to come back to the real world.
RR:
I left the “real world” in my late twenties when I moved to Malaysia
(after travelling for nine months) to make myself a writer. I had read an autobiography by Norman Hall
who had moved to Tahiti and wrote the Mutiny
on the Bounty trilogy with Charles Nordhoff, and thought, now there’s an
idea! I thought I’d give it two years
and if it didn’t work out, return to the company I had worked with....I’m
still here, but now living in Borneo....
Living so long in London, do you
consider yourself a Malaysian writer or an expat writer or just a writer who happens
to be living in London?
IVY:
Now that’s
tough, Robert! Someone once said
patriotism is the love of the food one ate as a child. I have been away too long. I now only have dim glimpses and snatches of
details of Malaysian life and culture. I
would consider myself a London writer of Malaysian origin.
RR: Me, I’m an expat writer who
happens to be American. I felt more
Malaysian early on when I was writing the stories that became Lovers and Strangers Revisited, many
written from the viewpoint of Malaysians.
Then I began working on an expat novel.
I wrote two expat novels. Lately,
my novels are mostly set in the US....Perhaps, in a way, I’m missing home,
though I feel more at home here with my wife and two children (I have a third working
in West Malaysia). I have a hard time
relating to what is going on in America these days, socially, politically...
Something I do miss is a literary
scene. Penang and Kuala Lumpur held
literary events now and then, readings, well-known writers from overseas
stopping by as part of an Asian tour....I used to meet with two expat novelists
and the three of us would get together and exchange our work in these marathon
meetings that were fantastic until I accidentally offended one of them, who was
very sensitive about her novel (she had a traumatic, war-torn childhood). Then soon after, she moved away. She was very talented and years later her novel
sold and did very well in the US and now she has another novel out. I just wished we didn’t have that falling out
because we had a good thing going....I did teach creative writing in Penang and
Kuching at the university level and that was fun workshopping their
stories. We all learned.
Are you actively involved in the
London literary scene, regularly attending readings or workshops or being
part of a writing group? Does it help
with your writing or can it be more of a distraction or an excuse not to
write? (I’ll never be as good as
so-and-so, or who has time to write with all of these literary events going
on?)
IVY: I am
in the London literary scene both virtual and real. I prefer real face to face interaction as opposed
to online groups. For example, I am
attending the Brixton Book Jam this month.
I am also a member of the South London Writers’ Group. I joined the City Lit Writers’ Club when I
first arrived in the UK and I completed my MA in Writing at Middlesex
University. Let’s face it, writing is a
solitary profession. I attend groups or
workshops when I am not writing or need motivation, encouragement or just a
drink, without any real aim. I am
attending the London Lit Lab in Hackney in October for a weekend workshop
which I am really looking forward to. Meeting
writers in the flesh is the most inspiring experience. I meet my fellow Unbound authors every few
months or so in a pub room in London. Online
I am a member of Facebook groups such as the Book Connectors, The Crime Book
Club and the Unbound Social Club. These
are fine, but they are still social media and can suck up time. There is no end to it.
RR:
How do you keep yourself motivated to write novels, especially when you
feel the novel is not going as well as you had intended? Do you share your early drafts with other
writers or friends? If so, is it
encouraging or discouraging?
IVY: It is never going as well as intended. No first draft does. I am just a simple jovial pessimist like any
other writer. For me the first
motivation comes from turning up at the job.
If I just sit there, and think, it’s already a hundred per cent better
than not sitting there and thinking,
even if I do not write a word. If you
can’t think, you can’t write. And if you
don’t think, you will write rubbish. The
second motivation comes from knowing the ending. I have to know the ending for me to proceed. Better still, I need to know the “twist” at
the end (but this is just a bonus). I
don’t share any drafts with anyone. Period. I trust my own instincts to get to the end of
the first draft and do at least another two before it’s ready.
The reason being I got my fingers burnt by an
early experience. About twelve years ago
I was very nearly signed by a prominent agent.
She read the first 10,000 words of my novel and said this is the most
amazing thing she had ever read, was thrilled to bits and she asked to see “the
rest”. I was even asked to go in to
their very grand offices in Soho Square.
You can imagine my excitement, stupidity and naiveté. However, I had not written this mysterious
thing called “the rest”. In a big rush I
completed the novel and showed her the worst first draft ever known in
publishing history. I was dropped. She did not even return my calls. And “the rest” as they say is history.
RR:
Sorry, I had to laugh. It
reminded me of Lisa Jewell who, on a bet, wrote three chapters of her first novel
Ralph’s Party and submitted it to an
agent, who then requested “the rest”. Taking
it on faith that she “had” an agent, she rearranged her life and for the next
year wrote “the rest” and hand delivered it to this agent who was flabbergasted
when she showed up at her office. You
just don’t do that, and a year later! No
shame! Lucky for her, the book was well
written and it launched her career. Sometimes you just have to write on faith that
someone really wants your book and is willing to wait a year to receive
it! You just have to make sure it’s
worth the wait! Rushing your work to
pass to someone, as you and I and others have learned the hard way, merely
backfires. Get it right first because
you only get one shot to make a first impression — impressing the right agent.
You learn by writing (and rewriting),
by finishing, and by submitting...
IVY: What a
way to learn, but in those days there was no social media or any kind of
detailed advice that you could get about the submission process. You just bungle along and learn as you screw
up. That book became my first novel Cry of the Flying Rhino after 14 drafts
and 12 years and won a prize. Heart of
Glass went through nine. I am
getting better at doing fewer drafts because I am thinking clearer with each
draft, rather than randomly drafting and changing direction with every whim. I am aiming for five to seven drafts for my
third book, which I am now a third of the way through.
RR:
Is it a sequel to one of the
other two novels, or is it a stand alone?
Can you tell us a little about it?
IVY: It is
a modern literary suspense novel told in multiple voices and viewpoints on the
themes of memory and loss. A vulgar
wealthy London banker in his early fifties leaves his wife and daughter for a
hedonistic lifestyle under the pretext of a career move to Singapore. He gets a Thai girlfriend, a yacht, a luxury
penthouse and lives the dream until one day there is a storm. He crashes the yacht and is shipwrecked. He loses his memory and when he gains
consciousness he has to live the life of the person they “think” he is.
RR:
Sounds intriguing, especially if they are manipulating him for their
personal gain! I’ve met expats like that, who end up ruining
their lives (and their families). Some
work out okay, but many gets played by their “girlfriend and girlfriend’s
family”, or end up losing their high flying job over a low lying maid or a prostitute,
forgetting why they came to Southeast Asia in the first place (to advance
their career), drawn into that hedonistic lifestyle. Some end up as a drug addict, in prison or
dead. I guess it was fun while it
lasted...sad, though. Somerset
Maugham wrote about them, too....Some people just never learn. Good
luck with your book.
Tell us about your typical day or
week as a writer. Do you anticipate any major changes in your
working schedule once your books come out?
IVY:
I don’t have
a rigid routine as my day job number one, being a freelance architect, is deadline-oriented. Also if I wake up with an interesting dream,
I will write that down instead. I am a
slow writer. I can’t do what other
people do such as write 2,000 words at a go, per day. If I manage 500 I am really ecstatic. I try to write by hand about 10 to 30 minutes
when I wake up (in the winter months at 06:45 or 07:00 if I am lazy; in the
summer months 05:45). Using my trusted
fountain pen, it could be stream of consciousness type thing or it may be just
thinking and note-taking. I stop and I
make the children their breakfast before they go to school and do my day job
number one, where I have a degree of flexibility. In mid morning to mid afternoon I usually
cannot write a word so I may as well work.
On Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons I teach music (piano or guitar) to
children and adults. This is my day job
number two. I really love my jobs and I
don’t know what to do without them as they are a great displacement activity
from writing. After cooking and eating
dinner and the children’s bedtime, I may bash away again for another thirty
minutes to an hour. A writer never
really stops working, so while I may not be writing, it still counts as my
thinking time. Once my books come out, I
anticipate cutting back on new projects or commissions for my day job number
one. I would like to be writing in the
day time for longer periods. This would
be for me living the dream. Writing is
like having homework forever and ever.
RR:
I laughed out loud. My children,
age 10 and 12, refer to my writing as homework, something they can relate to. “Don’t disturb Daddy, he’s doing his
homework!” In a sense, it’s true. I’m
working from home; hence homework! Now
and then they get a glimpse that maybe what I’m doing is important like when a
French crew recently came to my house to interview me while filming a documentary
on Somerset Maugham in Malaysia for the Franco-German Cultural Channel Arte.
What advice would you give your
17-year-old self before you attended
that first workshop in Kuala Lumpur?
What would you have done differently?
Also, what advice would you give to an aspiring novelist just starting
out?
IVY: I
would tell myself to not have so much fun and at least be taking notes or
collecting name cards. What I would have
done differently: I would have not used
writing as a past time or a subsidiary extension of reading, rather taken it
more seriously. I did not know that you
could take it seriously or be taken seriously.
I thought that writing was something that you stumbled into like Alice
down the rabbit hole. What advice I
would give to an aspiring novelist just starting out: Firstly, read, read, read. Read anything and everything. Secondly, nothing has changed — the five
ingredients still apply — inspiration, time, effort, commitment and energy. Thirdly, don’t obsess about social media. It really doesn’t matter. Only the writing matters.
—Borneo Expat Writer
*Update: Received Ivy's book Cry of the Flying Rhino and posted her acceptance speech in Hong Kong.
For SIGNED FIRST LIMITED EDITIONS of Cry of the Flying Rhino
For book orders:
Paperback: amazon.com
Paperback: amazon.co.uk
Kindle eBook: US
*Update: Received Ivy's book Cry of the Flying Rhino and posted her acceptance speech in Hong Kong.
For SIGNED FIRST LIMITED EDITIONS of Cry of the Flying Rhino
For book orders:
Paperback: amazon.com
Paperback: amazon.co.uk
Kindle eBook: US
Ivy Ngeow interviewing Robert Raymer
My other interviews with First Novelists:
Golda Mowe author of Iban Dream and Iban Journey.
Preeta Samarasan, author of Evening is the Whole Day, finalist for the Commonwealth Writers Prize 2009.
Chuah Guat Eng, author of Echoes of Silence and Days of Change.
Also, Malachi Edwin Vethamani, author of Complicated Lives and Life Happens.
Five part Maugham and Me series
Golda Mowe author of Iban Dream and Iban Journey.
Preeta Samarasan, author of Evening is the Whole Day, finalist for the Commonwealth Writers Prize 2009.
Chuah Guat Eng, author of Echoes of Silence and Days of Change.
Also, Malachi Edwin Vethamani, author of Complicated Lives and Life Happens.
Five part Maugham and Me series
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