The Plot Twist

Singapore Writers Festival (SWF) is currently underway - it runs at various venues until November 26.  To suit our strange times, this year’s theme is plot twist - embracing strange approaches, unexpected outcomes, sudden changes in direction, unlikely connections, and the unpredictable. Devika Misra reports.

The opening of SWF saw panellists debate the proposition: This House Believes AI is the Better Writer. Is AI an opportunity or a threat to literature? Can it make good writers better? These were questions addressed by panellists Colin Goh, the Singaporean writer, and creator of the Dim Sum Warriors comics; Arianna Pozzuoli, the Canadian-Singaporean poet and storyteller; Nessa Anwar, playwright and journalist; Marc Nair, Singaporean poet; Melizarani T Selva, Malaysian writer and poet. 

Dear Chrysanthemums: A Novel in Stories by Fiona Sze-Lorrain

 Devika Misra reports.

Singaporean-born, Paris-based Fiona Sze-Lorrain is a poet, translator, musician, and now novelist. Her debut work of fiction Dear Chrysanthemums can be read as a novel or as separate interconnected short stories. Set in Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, Paris, and New York, the protagonists are all victims of difficult circumstances; young Asian women, alone, vulnerable and struggling to survive displacement and sometimes violence and assault. Despite suffering lifelong mental anguish, they prove emotionally resilient and are keen to connect with the wider world as they construct different personas in challenging and ever-changing landscapes. 

The Siege of Tsingtau: The German-Japanese War 1914 by Charles Stephenson.

World War I in the Far East was a sideshow in the grand scheme of things, but it had long-reaching implications, setting up further conflict in the region. Nevertheless, the main action, the Battle of Tsingtau, was full of drama, bravery, and suffering, which is covered in the book – The Siege of Tsingtau: The German-Japanese War 1914 by Charles Stephenson.