When you don’t belong anywhere
With my international book tour beginning next month at Waterstones Leadenhall in London (and continuing to Bali, Singapore, Malaysia and back to Brighton in Blighty) to launch my latest and sixth novel In Safe Hands, I’ve been reflecting on how I became international, not by choice, but because I don’t quite belong anywhere.
Although I’ve lived in the UK for 29 years, 10 months and 16 days, I am definitely not British. Even when I feel British (watching TV, drinking house white in pubs, office banter, laughing at the jokes, and cracking them), I know I am still an ABI: another bloody immigrant. Like many ABIs, I came here to study, to work, and then to study and work some more. I’ve been away from Malaysia and Singapore for as long as I’ve been here, which means I’m not considered Asian enough to be Asian, yet never British enough to be British. I’m in no man’s land.
I’m not considered Asian enough to be Asian, yet never British enough to be British.
My writing has always reflected this tension. Only through fiction can I explore the big themes. They come to me when I am pushing the trolley in Sainsbury’s or queueing for a roll in Greggs. As I have written from the POV of many cultures, I feel that the themes of displacement come to me easily. I have the experience and maturity now. Over the years, my publisher has recognised this and positioned me for international festivals and launches. At first, I doth protest since I considered my home audience the UK.
I had thought of myself as a British author. I am living, writing and working in Britain, am I not? A voter, a taxpayer. I had always written for a British audience. I have written short stories with all-white characters, and they have been well-received and published. But publishers know the market, and so should I. I am not a diverse writer in the international gigs. Diverse is relative. Who is diverse? I am only addressing diverse themes (identity, migration, family, and cultural tension) in my writing because they bug me, yet appeal to me.
It took me six novels to realise I had already found my audience: readers who understand the in-between, who know the struggle of not quite fitting anywhere. They are abroad, wherever that is.