Heart of Glass: Front cover done. Back blurb in progress. Some delays in August because I was torn between two cover options both of which I liked. Now we’re done being torn. Very exciting. Clue: 1980s! Yes! In sports news, Cry of the Flying Rhino: Hong Kong – the prize giving ceremony and launch is now only 4 weeks away! …
The Brief Crowdfunding Pitch De-Brief
So you have pitched and now you are wondering how the hell did I do? 1. On the pitching letter. Make it pithy and make each one the best letter you ever wrote. If you know them v well, aim for the heart. Go deeper. Ask how Anna’s Grade V piano exam went and how James’ operation …
Your Crowdfunding Pitch Letter
The letter needs to be pithy and to the point. Short direct pitches work better cos firstly people have no time and secondly they have no patience. It should be in three paragraphs only. The first paragraph: Introduce your product and what it is. Learn to cut out all that “how are you hope you’re well” …
Editing, schmediting and COVER DESIGN!
I have been working on the cover design with the graphic designer who has designed bestsellers like The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith and Marina Lewycka’s A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian. As a designer myself, I find it both easy and hard to take the back seat and let someone do …
EXCLUSIVE: Heart of Glass structural edit AND Cry of the Flying Rhino publication date
Doctor: So what seems to be the problem? Dude, I am not allowed to complain because I was and am a writer therefore I am already a masochist. In fact I am hanging upside down now flogging myself. It took me more than a decade (I think 13 years and still counting) to write both these …
EXCLUSIVE: L@@k inside Heart of Glass cutting room!
“Do not enter when light is on!” Structural edit: that means blasting, incision, internal tissue re-organisation and cosmetic surgery. But of course, I am not talking metaphorically at all. I am talking about the body of work. Words. I’ve created strict exam conditions in the attic AKA the cutting room. There’s no furniture. I sit …
Nasi lemak at Dapur while awaiting new passport
There has got to be a thrill to be subjected to a six hour wait to get one’s new passport in this day and age. And that thrill is Dapur, a Malaysian diner about three minutes’ walk from the visa and consular office at the Malaysian High Commission in London. Dapur means kitchen. It’s perfect …
100% in 100 days: Crowdfunding my book “Heart of Glass”
Crowdfunding. Is. Over. The three big little words. 100% in 100 days. And the last 3%? Was the longest, shortest journey in the world (I used to say that about giving birth: new person travelling down 62mm birth canal takes what? Anything from about 2 to 20 hours.) But what a push. What a journey. Made …
I was a punk even then
You can’t get more post-colonial, vintage and ironic than this! This photo was taken on my fifth birthday in Segamat, a little railway town in Johor, where we lived for a couple of years. It is on the line from Singapore to Bangkok via KL. We lived in a colonial bungalow which was the staff …
My first Prize-winning Story was Typed on this Typewriter
The first story which I wrote and submitted was for the 1984 New Straits Times Short Story Competition. It was called Miel and the Honey Bunch or something pretentious-sounding like that. The exact story and wording are all gone now. Success came to me early as a writer, to my detriment, as I since then I always …