Lovers and Strangers Revisited - 20 Years

Near the end of 2013 a friend from Penang sent me a Christmas card and mentioned that she was teaching my short story “Mat Salleh” from my collection Lovers and Strangers Revisited for her reading class at UiTM.  I then realized that 2013 was the 20^th anniversary of the original publication of Lovers and Strangers (Heinemann Asia, 1993).  Although I’m posting this a little late, I have a strong feeling I haven’t heard the end of these stories for years to come.

 

 “Mat Salleh” was the first short story from the collection published in The New Straits Times.  I sold it again a few months later to My Weekly in the UK, and then "The Future Barrister" won third prize in the 1988 Star contest and "Sister's Room" third place in a contest in the US.  I knew I was onto something.  The 17 short stories set mostly in Malaysia have so far been published 83 times in twelve countries, the collection won the 2009 Popular-The Star Reader’s Choice Award and has been translated into French.  (Previously, three stories had been translated into Japanese.) 

In 2005, a colleague at Universiti Sains Malaysia where I taught creative writing informed me that he was not only teaching my story “On Fridays” in his post colonial course on Singaporean and Malaysian Literature but also planning to teach the collection in the following semester.  Since the book had gone out of print, I contacted Silverfish Books (I was the editor for their Silverfish New Writing 4) and they agreed to re-publish the book.

Having revised the stories numerous times since its initial publishing, I wanted something more; so I revisited (and overhauled) each story—adding new openings, new endings, new back stories, even doubling several stories in length, which I wrote about in the introduction and then added the word ‘revisited’ to the title.

The first book launch in 1993 was organized by Penang Players (I was the stage manager for several productions and critiqued many of their plays prior to their performance.)  Penang Players not only sponsored the book launch they also read extracts from four stories and did a delightful play reading of One Drink Too Many, a comedy that I wrote based on the short story “Neighbours”, thus turning a simple book launch into a literary event attended by over 100 people.

In 2007, after moving to Sarawak, the Malaysian part of Borneo, I encountered some distribution problems, so I agreed to buy out the last of the stock from Silverfish and switched publishers to MPH (2008), followed by another round of editing and adding two stories.  I also created the blog series, The Story Behind the Story, for each of the 17 stories, separating fact from fiction and noting the significant changes that led to their various publications.

Here is the publication breakdown by story with a link to each The Story Behind the Story, except for "Moments," dropped for the revisited collection. *Updated: the total published stories now stand at 83.

14 – On Fridays
8 – Neighbors/Aftermath
7 – Teh-O in KL
7 – Sister’s Room
7 – The Future Barrister
6 – Dark Blue Thread/The Watermark
5 – Waiting
4 – The Station Hotel/Joking
4 – Smooth Stones
4 – Symmetry
5 – *The Stare (added to Silverfish version, replacing “Moments”)
3 – Only in Malaysia (added to MPH version)
3 – Transactions in Thai (added to MPH version)
2 – Home for Hari Raya (and also filmed by Ohio University)
2 – Mat Salleh
1 – Lovers and Strangers
0 – Watcher (blogged it)
1 – *Moments (dropped after original Lovers and Strangers collection)
83

“Neighbours” (about neighbors gossiping over a neighbor’s suicide) was then selected by the Malaysian Education Ministry to be part of the sixth cycle of reading texts for SPM literature for Form 5 students for 2008-2010.  Three times it has been renewed and will be be taught in selected schools through 2015. The Malaysian English Language Teaching Association (MELTA) also had an online thread for “Neighbours” with over 20,500 hits and 30 pages of comments (around 290) before they archived it then took it down.  Denis Harry even wrote an article for the New Straits Times about the story’s main character, a busybody, titled, “Are You Mrs. Koh?”

Over the years many students have contacted me about that story via my website or facebook. When I mentioned to one student whose class was adapting “Neighbours” into a play that I would be attending the Popular Bookfest in Kuala Lumpur the following week for Tropical Affairs, nominated for the 2010 Reader’s Choice Award, her teacher, Christina Chan organized a field trip bringing about a dozen students to meet me.  She said it was a rare opportunity for students in Malaysia to meet the writer of a story that they were currently studying (most had either passed away or lived overseas).   

Robert Raymer with Christina Tan and her students at Bookfest 2010

In addition to the collection itself (stories from the original collection were first taught at a high school in Canada), nine stories that I know of have been taught numerous times at several universities and private colleges throughout Malaysia (along with The Story Behind the Story, a handy aide for both teachers and students I’ve since learned).  In 2012, two of the stories “Mat Salleh” and “Home for Hari Raya” were even taught in the U.S. at Ohio University in their Southeast Asia Studies program (where I had the honor to skype with the students)

.

The Lovers and Strangers collection has been instrumental in other aspects of my life.  In fact, it helped me to land my first teaching job at Universiti of Sains Malaysia where for six years I taught two courses on writing and then created a new course on creative writing that I taught for four years before introducing the materials to Universiti of Malaysia Sarawak and taught it there for another three years.  (I had used Lovers and Strangers Revisited as a calling card while giving a creative writing workshop for MELTA in Kuching.)

Back in 2006 the collection Lovers and Strangers Revisited (and unfortunately the author) was even psychoanalyzed by a Malaysian academic at a short story collection conference in the UK.  As a writer, it’s imperative to develop a thick skin; it also comes in handy for reviews. Thanks to LSR, I’ve been interviewed several times in magazines, newspapers, and online.  I was even put on national TV along with my friend Georgette Tan, who earlier had given me a nice review in The Borneo Post.  Together we appeared on Kuppa Kopi with Sharnaz Sabera.

Georgette Tan, Robert Raymer and Sharnaz Sabera

In 2007, in reaction to a blog post by the Malaysian author Lydia Teh about publishing books in Malaysia, I posted a rather lengthy comment based on my experiences of publishing this collection in both countries, then I used it as the first posting for my own blog, Borneo Expat Writer.  Then in 2009, as part of publicity for LSR, I had been asked to write a short story for Going Places, Malaysia Airlines in-flight magazine for their August Merdeka (Independence) edition along with Lydia Teh and Tunku Halim, both successful authors in Malaysia whom I had yet to meet.   

Accepting the challenge, I quickly came up with an idea and an opening for “Merdeka Miracle”.  The three of us furiously sent emails back and forth between Kuching, Kuala Lumpur and Paris and London (where Tunku was travelling with his family) to craft a first draft and then revised it daily, about twenty times, to meet the tight deadline.  Later, at the same K.L. Bookfest where I met the students and their teacher, I finally got to meet Lydia Teh.

Lydia Teh and Robert Raymer and "The Merdeka Miracle"

I’m sure the success and the publicity surrounding Lovers and Strangers Revisited, which had just won the Popular Reader’s Choice Award, was largely responsible for me being named one of “50 Expatriates You Should Know” by Expatriate Lifestyle (January 2010)—quite an honor since most of the other expats were diplomats, celebrities, or leaders in their industry and mostly living in Kuala Lumpur, while I taught creative writing, gave workshops, and wrote books in Sarawak.

Robert Raymer standing between nominated writers Yvonne Lee and Adeline Loh.

In 2011 Editions GOPE translated Lovers and Strangers Revisited into French and published it as Trois autres Malaisie, which means "Three Other Malaysia".   Then Ohio University School of Arts, Media & Studies turned my story “Home for Hari Raya” into a film, shot in Malaysia in December 2012/January 2013.  The 24-minute film can now be seen on YouTube.

 

Twenty years has gone by quickly, but the stories in that original Lovers and Strangers collection have come a long way since 1993.  And for 2014, its 21^st year, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens next.
          —Borneo Expat Writer

*Update: Rewriting Lovers and Strangers Revisited

                    

                                        And: Trust the Novel Writing (and rewriting) Process. 

Here are links to four of my author-to-author interviews of 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. 

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

Plus:

Five part Maugham and Me series

BookFest@2010

Tropical Affairs didn’t win, so no two years in a row for me, but I did have a nice time. I finally met with Lydia Teh, whom I wrote “The Merdeka Miracle” with last year. Too bad Tunku Halim couldn’t join us.

I also met with authors Kuan Guat Choo and Peggy Tan Pek Tao, a former colleague of mine at USM, and this year’s winner for non-fiction for her book Life The Malaysian Style. So that’s two years in a row for USM!

Afterwards I met with Yvonne Lee, who gave me a copy of her latest book, Madness Aboard! for writing a blurb inside, after we met at the BookFest last year. I also caught up with Lee Eeleen, who has been making headway with lots of her short stories lately, reminding me about a big opportunity to publish some of my own short stories in Singapore that I overlooked! I also met with several MPH representatives, including Eric Forbes and Shirley Ng, whom I’m in contact with constantly over marketing and publicity and ordering books. She been extremely helpful!

After managing to miss me last year when I won for Lovers and Strangers Revisited though he did get to see the trophy before I headed back to Kuching, Zaini, who features in Tropical Affairs, cut one of his classes to give me some family support. When walking with him, all the teenage girls check him out!

The following day I was back with Zaini at the BookFest to meet with Christina Chan and eleven of her students, who are studying my short story “Neighbours” in SPM literature. One of the students, Shorolipi, had contacted me on Facebook, and within days, thanks to their teacher, we had an impromptu meet-the-author-session with lots of questions about “Neighbours” and writing. I may have even inspired one or two to become writers. Although I think they were more taken with Zaini….A friend of theirs wrote on Facebook, “Did anyone get his number?”

This is the press release that I wrote for the education section of the Star. Shirley, who coincidentally attended the same secondary school, contacted the press on our behalf, but they were short-handed for reporters. I’m still waiting for the official photos from Popular.

Press Release: From Facebook to Face-to-Face BookFest Meeting with Author Robert Raymer

Shorolipi Emma Chaudhury of SMK (p) Sri Aman, Petaling Jeya who is studying Robert Raymer’s short story “Neighbours” in SPM literature noticed that he was on Facebook and decided to contact him. Within days, she and ten of her classmates and their teacher Christina Chan and another colleague were meeting with Raymer, author of last year’s Reader’s Choice Award winning collection of short stories Lovers and Strangers Revisited (MPH 2008). As luck would have it, the Sarawak-based American author, who’s latest book, Tropical Affairs: Episodes from an Expat’s life in Malaysia (MPH 2009) was nominated for this year’s prize, just happened to be coming to Kuala Lumpur to attend the BookFest@ Malaysia 2010.

While exchanging a few Facebook replies, Raymer directed her to his blog series The Story Behind the Story of Lovers and Strangers Revisited, to “Neighbors, a Suicide and Making Choices” in Tropical Affairs, and to a MELTA forum for some insights into the story and how he wrote it. When Christina Chan learned that Raymer was coming to KL, she asked if it would be possible that he meet her and her Form 4 students, which he gamely agreed. Raymer suggested they meet at the BookFest, which then turned into an impromptu Q-and-A session about “Neighbours” and about writing.

“What’s a better place to meet an author than at a super huge bookstore?” Raymer quipped. “I thought that meeting them might be fun and that, perhaps, I may even inspire one or two to become writers.”

Christina Chan agreed and told him afterwards, "I honestly don't think the students anywhere actually ever get to meet the authors whose stories they are studying. That's why my girls are very privileged to have met you."

Raymer, however, felt the privilege was all his. He was tickled to learn that several of the students were involved in putting on a play based on his short story. He even met the student who would play the busybody character Mrs. Koh!

Although in the past students studying his short story in SPM literature (or other stories in Malaysian universities and private colleges) have contacted him on Facebook, through his blog on writing, this was the first time they actually got to meet! And it happened so fast!

As a bonus, the students also met Raymer’s 19-year-old son Zaini who features in Tropical Affairs as a boy growing up in Penang. Yeah, they added him to Facebook, too!

Several students and their teacher even managed to pick up autographed copies of Raymer’s books, all thanks to Shorolipi’s Facebook initiative that quickly turned into a face-to-face BookFest meeting with the author—something they’ll never forget.

*Update, the 20^th anniversary of Lovers and Strangers Revisited

Here are links to some of my author-to-author interviews of 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. 

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

Plus:

Five part Maugham and Me series

Beheaded on Road to Nationhood: Sarawak Reclaimed—Part I 

The Story Behind the Story: A Teaching and Learning Aid

Two students from UKM (Malaysia) contacted me on Facebook about my short story “Teh-O in K.L.” from Lovers and Strangers Revisited, which they are studying in their TESL program. They were doing a report on it and wanted to know the significance of the title. After I directed them to my blog, "Teh-o in KL: The Story Behind the Story", one of the students replied, “Thank you so much. A lot of correction has to be made based on reading your blog. Guessed we just touched the issue only at the surface (culture adaptation by foreigner), without realizing how do they feel.”

At UM where they teach three stories and at USM where they teach the entire collection, they actually use The Story Behind the Story as both a teaching and a learning aid for the students. What a great idea, I thought!

When I completed the blog series for all seventeen set-in-Malaysia stories in Lovers and Strangers Revisited, I knew it would be useful for writers wanting to learn how to write a short story, the tricks (and the hard work) behind the literary magic. Rarely does a writer rewrite a published short story, yet, here I was revisiting those stories from the original Heinemann Asia publication of Lovers and Strangers (1993), rethinking them, even overhauling them for Lovers and Strangers Revisited (Silverfish 2005) and the expanded MPH version (2008), winner of the 2009 Popular-The Star Reader’s Choice Awards for fiction.

I also wanted to separate the fact from the fiction. In the preface to LSR, I wrote, “There’s a lot of truth in all fiction and a lot of fiction in all truth, so what may seem real may, in fact, be made up, and what may seem made up could very well be based on fact.” But, oh, the line between fact and fiction does blur a lot, so I thought this blog series would help to untangle it all, and show how a fact can be a great jumping off place for fiction.

But the Story Behind the Story blog series is much more than that, a behind the scenes look at a writer working at his craft. In the blog, I noted what prompted the idea, be it a character, a setting, a theme, a snippet of dialogue, and what significant editing and story changes that I made that led to their publication locally and overseas (fourteen have been published in US,UK, Australia). Altogether they’ve been published 77 (*now 81) times, taught in SPM literature and in universities and private colleges throughout Malaysia.

While making direct comparisons between the first published versions of my stories with those in the MPH collection for the blogs, I was blown away by how much the stories had in fact evolved. At a glance, it may look like the same story, but the differences are both subtle and stark. It’s not just the details, the preciseness of language; there have been changes of titles, of characters, of beginnings and endings, of point of view, and even shifting from past tense to present tense. Some of the stories even doubled in length; they had whole new endings, or new back-story weaved into it to make the story complete.

By comparing the MPH stories with the story’s blog would be invaluable to writers just learning their craft or wishing to break out, but also interesting to literature students and readers to see how much the stories have changed. You mean that critical scene at the jetty in “On Fridays” wasn’t even in the original, published story!

For teachers and students, a lot of insight can be gleaned from the blog series which can lead to discussions about character’s motivation, or the underlying theme, and all that’s going on just beneath the surface of the story—the real story behind the story.

Of course the one who learned the most through this process of putting this blog series together was me. I grew as a writer. More importantly, I could see the proof of how far I’ve come, which encourages me to push harder, and for that I have to thank those students who have contacted me, and their teachers and lecturers for their interest in the stories from Lovers and Strangers Revisited.

* * *

As a footnote, since posting this, a student from Kuala Lumpur contacted me about my short story "Neighbours" that she is studying for SPM literature. I sent her the "Neighbours: Story Behind the Story" link which she greatly appreciated and now she is sharing that with her teacher and fellow classmates. I also mentioned the article “Neighbours, a Suicide, and Making Choices” from Tropical Affairs. The teacher, she said, was already sharing this with the students,and making the book available for them to read.

That’s great, so now those students will get the whole story of “Neighbours”, the short story itself, the truth of my involvement in that suicide (finding him, sending him to the hospital, and having to tell his wife what just happened since none of my neighbors wanted to get involved), the decisions that I made as a writer to write that particular story (the choices I made since there were different stories that I could have written about this experience), and now all that went into the actual writing and revisiting the story, including changing the original title from “Aftermath” (after it had been published four times) to “Neighbours”.

Here are links to some of my author-to-author interviews of 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. 

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

Plus:

Five part Maugham and Me series

Beheaded on Road to Nationhood: Sarawak Reclaimed—Part I 

Malay Mail, 5 November 2008

Revisiting tales
By GABEY GOH November 05, 2008 Categories: Blogspot

When expatriate Robert Raymer (during a moment of weakness) did a Google search on himself last year to gauge the buzz surrounding his book, what he discovered was a unique take on the old adage: "Never judge a book by its cover".

"A blog entry caught my eye and caught me by surprise, so that's what people are thinking about my book!" writes the American-born author of Lovers and Strangers Revisited, a collection of short stories set in Malaysia.

The post in question, was that of a student who shared a conversation with the book store cashier, about the misconstrued stigma attached to book titles – while picking up a copy of Raymer's book.

"After reading this blog entry, I had to smile – so that's why the book wasn’t selling well at USM bookstore! People were too embarrassed by the title. Sounds like others would stare or glare at them for even picking up the book, let alone trying to buy it," he continued.

The biggest boon of blogging for writers has been its role, not only as a launching pad to promote their works, but also as an evolving workbook and diary for their ideas. Along with his musings about the craft of writing and the business of publishing, visitors to his blog will get to delve into his current project.

"Now I’m doing a series of posts, as part of my writing blog, called The Story Behind the Story: Lovers and Strangers Revisited , whereby I blog about how the various stories came to be written," says Raymer, who noted it would be interesting for readers to see how much the stories, over a span of 20 years, have evolved.

How and when did you start your blog?

When blogging was first recommended to me by several writers, it didn’t make any sense, plus it sounded like it would eat into my limited writing time, since I teach full time and have small children at home. Then Krista Goon, whom I taught creative writing to at Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), kept sending me links to various writers, mostly Malaysian, who have blogs. One was Lydia Teh, she was reacting to a blog post by Sharon Bakar, about the realities of publishing books in Malaysia. It struck a chord with me and I shot off a reply to Lydia’s blog, which turned out to be a rather lengthy comment. In fact, it was a full length article because I had a lot to say on the matter based on my years of experience publishing books in Malaysia and Singapore.

Having written this article, I thought, why not start my own blog on writing with the same article (and on the same day), which I did on May 19, 2007. The hardest decision was deciding what to call it. I came up with BorneoExpatWriter: Borneo, since I was moving there, Expat, since that is what I am, and Writer, because that is what I do.

Has your blogging changed your life?

Blogging hasn’t changed my life, just my writing life, or how I view writing. Before, I would write or pitch articles for publications, but now I write posts on writing to help inspire other writers. Then later, I think some of these would make pretty good articles, so I would rewrite them and submit them for publication. This is a recent development, but so far one has already been published. So blogging in this sense serves a new purpose for me, it gets me to write articles that I may not have written in the first place, plus they become fodder for paying articles and workshops.

It’s also nice when readers of my stories and former writing students stumble across my website or blog and contact me. Also the website/blog is invaluable for editors, agents, publishers and reviewers to get more information about me and to read samples of my writing. So far I’ve got one US$500 writing assignment from the US, one full page interview and book review ( Borneo Post ), and one workshop presentation (in Miri) from strangers who came across my website.

Any regrets?

I only wished I had started blogging sooner, before there were a billion other bloggers out there.

What in "Cybersphere" amazes you?

How quickly unfounded rumors can spread and how much damage one person with a perceived grievance or a grudge (or just because he can), can humiliate or destroy someone’s life by posting malicious gossip or doctored photographs or stealing their identity and their money! Scary!

If you really had to choose one website to interact with?

Your Success Store and its weekly Your Achievement Ezine because of all the great advice that you get from leading success experts on all aspects of your life, from people like Jim Rohn, Denis Waitley, John Gray, Brian Tracy, Zig Ziglar, you name it. It’s not just one person’s point of view; it’s dozens of the most successful people on this planet, those who’ve walked the walk for years, for decades, before they begin to talk.

What would you really like to achieve through Cyberspace communication?

I would like to find an agent who then finds an international publisher for my novels, someone who has the wisdom and the persistence to attract readers from all over the globe so I can stop teaching and write full time to achieve my goal of publishing 20 bestselling books in 20 years.

If there were someone you could influence to take up blogging, who would it be?

I would like to see a joint blog with Moses, Jesus and Muhammad (with Buddha as a special guest), so they can tell us in their own words what they really said, what they really meant, how we got it all wrong (assuming we did), and how we can start to make it all right before it’s too late. There’s too much anger, hate, wars in this world, and most of it caused by misunderstanding or misinterpreting what those original words really mean.

Memorable incidents?

Blogging from Borneo proves that the world is smaller. A French woman visiting her son in Australia stumbled on my blog and as it turns out she lives 15 minutes from us here in Sarawak, so she invited us over to her lovely house for some appetizers, one of which was smoked salmon from a Dutch man, who does this as a hobby. Oh, that salmon was unbelievable good!

Then a man from Canada contacted me and said he used to take ballroom dancing lessons from this woman in her house in the Bidayuh village, Quop, here in Sarawak. As it turns out, that woman is my wife’s mother. And I didn’t even know that she taught dancing! Maybe I should ask her to teach me, it’s been a while since I last danced the tango.


*Update, the 20^th anniversary of Lovers and Strangers Revisited

Here are links to some of my author-to-author interviews of 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. 

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

Plus:

Five part Maugham and Me series

Beheaded on Road to Nationhood: Sarawak Reclaimed—Part I 

Never Judge a Book by Its...Title

Ok, I admit it, I googled myself. Shameful, I know. I caught myself in a weak moment. Curiosity got the better of me. To be honest I googled not just me but also my book, Lovers and Strangers Revisited, a collection of short stories set in Malaysia. I wanted to see if it was creating any kind of buzz, even if it was merely a single bee.

Then a blog entry caught my eye and caught me by surprise, too – so that’s what people are thinking about my book! A Malay student at Universiti Sains Malaysia, whom I don’t know, wrote about her conversation with another Malay woman who worked at the USM bookstore about my book. By the way, isn’t Internet a wonder­ful way to eavesdrop on private thoughts made public?

I won’t mention the student’s name or her blog to protect her privacy, although by the fact that she wrote it in a blog instead of in her diary, she was hardly keeping it private. To make it easier to follow (and less confusing, and to help distinguish between the two speakers), I separated the lines and added quotation marks. The teacher in me also cleaned up some minor grammar mistakes, though I left in a few “u” for you.

A year ago (how was I to know?), the student posted in her blog: I just bought a storybook after 4 years of buying and photocopying chemistry books! Thanks to [my friend], who succeeded in influencing me lately to read more books. We need to brush up our English! Her influence really hit me hard on my brain. It's true. I have not touched any fiction or nonfiction books for a VERY LONG TIME. At last, on the 17 of March at 1.15 pm, I went to USM's bookshop to buy a storybook entitled Lovers and Strangers Revisited written by Robert Raymer, a lecturer in my [university] teaching Creative Writing.

I went to the counter to pay for the book and the cashier suddenly looked at me with a blunt look on her face.

“Who recommended this book?”‌ she said to me, her right hand holding my book.

I looked back at her with a blur curved smile on my face. “A friend of mine. She just bought that book yesterday. I found it really interesting...”

And then she got a little bit excited, and we started a short conversation as she seemed to be so deadly interested about the book. Actually, I've never talked to her before cause she looked a bit serious most of the time.

“What do u think of the title? Do u feel uncomfortable when u look at the title?”
I didn't get the idea of her asking me like that.

“Don't u feel a bit shy (or ashamed) to buy this book when u looked at the title?”‌

I looked at her with my sleepy eyes and said, “Why, it’s just a book.” (Small grin again)

“Yeah that's right!” she said. “I answered the same thing too to some customers who felt uncomfortable to buy this book cause of the title.”‌

In my heart, I never knew some people are like that! It’s just a book...‌.

Then she continued, “Yeah…the contents are more important than the title, right?”

“Yeah, right! Anyway, the title doesn't reflect the cover of the book. Unless the cover is ... you know. It just didn't make any sense why these people felt uncomfortable about it. ‌ A sketch of [the KL railroad station] is the cover illustration which is so dull.
“I just read half of it,” ‌she said with a friendly smile.

“I just read ‘On Fridays’. It was really interesting and I bought this book to read his other stories.”

“I like ‘On Fridays!’” Now she sounded more excited than before. It makes me feel like I was there! Her eyes glowed with excitement.

And me? Yeah me, too. “I think it's worth to buy.” ‌

I smiled at her as she handed the book and walked out from the bookstore as she was saying salam to me. I walked hurriedly to my hostel as I was hungry and I got a class at three. In my heart I was really happy, not because of the book but my conversation with that cashier.
                                                               *  *  *

After reading this blog entry, I had to smile, too – so that's why the book wasn't selling well at USM bookstore! People were too embarrassed by the title. Sounds like others would stare or glare at them for even picking up the book (let a lone trying to buy it!), as if to say, "How dare you read something like that! Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?"

But as the blogger had pointed out, wasn’t the cover a giveaway? A boring railway station – no hint of scandal or bad taste there! I chose the railway station because one of the short stories is set there, “The Station Hotel”. (Ok, the main character was having an affair.)

When I chose the original title back in 1993, I was trying to find a way to tie in all of the stories; some of the stories were about lovers and other stories about strangers, so I chose Lovers and Strangers, after the title of one of the stories. Later, while hawking the book at two book fairs – KL and Singapore – I suspected that I chose the wrong title. Men would see the title and dismiss it as “romance”.

Several stories, I admit, are about affairs. But other stories are not. “Symmetry”, for example, is about a little girl finding a dead cockroach in someone’s empty glass of tea. “The Watcher” is about an elder Chinese man rediscovering life through his great grandson. Even the story that the two women liked, “On Fridays” is about a man feeling lonely after sitting beside a Malay woman in a share taxi, but nothing happens – they never meet. This story, by the way, has been published nine times in six countries including France and USA.

Now the title of the heavily revised collection is Lovers and Strangers Revisited, and the story “Neighbours” due to be published in the US in 2007, has even been chosen by the Ministry of Education to be taught in SPM literature in 2008. Obviously they didn’t let the title of the collection bother them. Nor did they judge the book by its cover – nor should we. Covers can influence you to pick it up and browse through it – that's the whole idea.

Also, we should never judge a book by the controversy surrounding it. Read the book for yourself, or at the very least skim through it to see what the fuss is about. Most people who make alarming statements about a particular book or about its author haven’t even bothered to glance through the book, let alone read it! They just jump on the not-so-literary bandwagon and let their emotions carry them away.

As for me, I greatly appreciate the fact that this student – after years of not buying any fiction – decided to buy my book. I feel honored. I also liked the fact that she had this semi-literary conversation with this other woman about the book, and they both liked the story “On Fridays”. If only more Malaysians would read and discuss books! But there is hope, judging from this blog, and other bloggers out there discussing the books they’ve been reading. I’m also glad that my book was able to bring these two ladies together. And to have them depart as friends, with smiles on their faces. What more can a writer ask for – other than being at the top of the bestseller’s list? Still, this blog entry made my day. Perhaps I should google myself more often, or at least my book, to see if anyone else is buzzing…

* As an update, when I switched publishers to MPH I got a new cover.  The book also went on to win an award.  And now it's coming out in French.

** A revised version of the above article found it's way into Tropical Affairs.

***Update, the 20^th anniversary of Lovers and Strangers Revisited

Here are links to some of my author-to-author interviews of 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. 

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

Plus:

Five part Maugham and Me series

Beheaded on Road to Nationhood: Sarawak Reclaimed—Part I