Book log 2018 #7 - Remang
Apr. 13th, 2018 07:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lonemagpieREMANG edited by Daphne Lee
An anthology of Malaysian ghost stories, which were entertaining. Some were more atmospheric than others, a couple – in particular the last one, Zirafah – quite touching. We tend to think of Victoriana when we think of ghost stories in the west, so it was nice to read some rather different ones. Some of the stories contain ghosts, some have local folkloric creatures such as the pontianak – and I don't think I've actually read a piece of modern fiction with the langsuir before, so it was quite a thrill to find some in here – though one of the stories (The Man In Red) doesn't actually seem to have anything particularly ghostly or supernatural at all.
If the collection has a failing it's that the endings of a number of the stories are unsatisfying, coming suddenly as if the writer has hit the word count and needs to stop, but this is true of many, many, short fiction collections. Western readers might be a little confused by occasional Malay or Indonesian colloquialisms in dialogue, but that's their problem, IMO, and in most cases readers will get used to it and get the gist.
For what it's worth, my favourites in here were: Grandmother Story (Sharmilla Ganesan), Umbrella Exit (Paul GnanaSelvam), The Twins Of Ramakhu (Heidi Shamsuddin, and this did give me a faint Jamesian buzz), Tok La's Gift (Fazlyn Abdul Malek), Heirloom (William Tham), and Zirafah (Wong Jo-Yen). But, really, they were all good. The first story, The Spectre Huntsman (Tunku Halim) is probably the weakest, relatively speaking and they get better from there on in. Which is a good thing.
It's probably difficult to get hold of over here, but worth the effort.
An anthology of Malaysian ghost stories, which were entertaining. Some were more atmospheric than others, a couple – in particular the last one, Zirafah – quite touching. We tend to think of Victoriana when we think of ghost stories in the west, so it was nice to read some rather different ones. Some of the stories contain ghosts, some have local folkloric creatures such as the pontianak – and I don't think I've actually read a piece of modern fiction with the langsuir before, so it was quite a thrill to find some in here – though one of the stories (The Man In Red) doesn't actually seem to have anything particularly ghostly or supernatural at all.
If the collection has a failing it's that the endings of a number of the stories are unsatisfying, coming suddenly as if the writer has hit the word count and needs to stop, but this is true of many, many, short fiction collections. Western readers might be a little confused by occasional Malay or Indonesian colloquialisms in dialogue, but that's their problem, IMO, and in most cases readers will get used to it and get the gist.
For what it's worth, my favourites in here were: Grandmother Story (Sharmilla Ganesan), Umbrella Exit (Paul GnanaSelvam), The Twins Of Ramakhu (Heidi Shamsuddin, and this did give me a faint Jamesian buzz), Tok La's Gift (Fazlyn Abdul Malek), Heirloom (William Tham), and Zirafah (Wong Jo-Yen). But, really, they were all good. The first story, The Spectre Huntsman (Tunku Halim) is probably the weakest, relatively speaking and they get better from there on in. Which is a good thing.
It's probably difficult to get hold of over here, but worth the effort.