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The book fairies visited me and left this book. Really enjoyed this one, especially the first half of the book which contained a semifactual semi fictional Simon Tay essay about wild chickens in seletar, a balli Kaur jaswal story about an Indian family aspiring to move to the west and a Jeremy Tiang story about an escaped prisoner. The second half of the book was a little patchier but overall a great addition to singlit and our literature that contains a sense of place.
From this I learnt Jeremy Tiang and Balli Kaur Jaswal are definitely writers I need to check out and follow up on! Their stories in this volume are quietly shimmering gems, just like Yu-Mei Balasingamchow's story in the first Balik Kampung redeemed that whole anthology. But I also learnt I'm really sick of Demolished-Building nostalgia, Unfilial-Successful-Son and Moping-Ageing-Housewife-Mourning-A-Lost-Past stock figures (hint: these were all crammed into ONE particular story).
Excellent. Some stories stronger than others but all give a fantastic sense of place and space.
Balik Kampung, edited by Verena Tay, is a series of anthologies featuring various neighbourhoods in Singapore. The volume I chose (3A) focuses on the northern districts, including places such as Marsiling, Seletar, and —everyone's favourite —Yishun. Consisting of 10 stories, all by different authors, the diversity of Balik Kampung 3A makes it a rather fascinating read (though of course, some pieces were better than others). There are also little features on the author at the end of every story...
