500 words from Ann Bennett

500 words from...is a series of guest posts from authors writing about Asia, and published by Asia-based, or Asia-focussed, publishing houses, in which they talk about their latest books. Here Ann Bennett writes about Bamboo Island, the second book in her World War II South East Asian trilogy.  Last year, in the Year of the Horse, the first book, Bamboo Heart, won the inaugural Asian Books Blog Book of the Lunar New Year. The trilogy is published by Monsoon, a company specialising in books that open windows onto South East Asian history.

So: over to Ann…

Catch-up: Asian Review of Books

Asian Review of Books kept up the flow of interesting material whilst Asian Books Blog was closed for Christmas and the Western New Year. Here are links to three weeks' worth of reviews, excerpts, letters, essays, listings, translations, news items, and round ups. 

All Monsters Must Die: An Excursion to North Korea by Magnus Bartas and Fredrik Ekman reviewed by Thomas London
Hong Kong-born poet Sarah Howe wins young writer of the year award 
Outside reading: links to interviews, essays and articles on translation, prizes, history, China 
Opera: Il Trovatore, Musica Viva, Hong Kong reviewed by Peter Gordon
China’s Disruptors: How Alibaba, Xiaomi, Tencent, and Other Companies are Changing the Rules of Business by Edward Tse reviewed by John D. Van Fleet

A tenor in Magadan: Vadim Kozin and Kseniya Melnik’s Snow in May posted by Peter Gordon
JFK’s Forgotten Crisis: Tibet, the CIA, and the Sino-Indian War by Bruce Riedel reviewed by Glyn Ford
Cosmopolites: The Coming of the Global Citizen by Atossia Araxia Abrahamian reviewed by Nicholas Gordon
Three Centuries of Conflict in East Timor by Douglas Kammen reviewed by Peter Gordon

Jade Dragon Mountain by Elsa Hart reviewed by Jonathan Chatwin
Outside reading: links to essays and news on books and writing from Japan, India, China, Israel 
The Age of Trade: The Manila Galleons and the Dawn of the Global Economy by Arturo Giraldez reviewed by Juan José Morales
The Gunpowder Age: China, Military Innovation, and the Rise of the West in World Historyby Tonio Andrade reviewed by Francis P Sempa

Little Aunt Crane by Yan Geling, translated from Chinese by Esther Tyldesley reviewed byRosie Milne
ARB Quarterly for January 2016 
Little Rice: Smartphones, Xiaomi, and the Chinese Dream by Clay Shirky reviewed byStephen Maire
Points of Origin, stories by Diao Dou, translated by Brendan O'Kane reviewed by Peter Gordon

The Asian Books Blog Book of the Lunar Year

Asian Books Blog runs its own literary award: The Asian Books Blog Book of the Lunar Year. The winner, for the Year of the Ram / Goat, now drawing to a close, will be announced on February 7, Chinese New Year’s Eve for the upcoming Year of the Monkey. 

Closing for Christmas

Merry Christmas! Merry reading! 
Best wishes for 2016!

The blog is closed from today, Monday 21 December, until Tuesday 12 January, when we'll be back with details of the Asian Books Blog Book of the Lunar Year Award, for the Year of the Sheep / Goat / Deer.

The Sunday Post

A rojak* of items that caught my eye this week…

Tales of Two Cities: Hong Kong and Singapore

Tales of Two Cities: An Anthology of Short Stories by the Hong Kong Writers Circle, and the Singapore Writers Group presents four faces of each city: the changing city; the historic city; the mystical city; the capricious city.  There are twenty three stories in the collection, which has been co-edited by Alice Clark-Platts, and S. Micky Lin, from the Singapore Writers Group, and Edmund Price and Harmony Sin, from the Hong Kong Writers Circle.  Here, Alice Clark-Platts gives a glimpse of how the collaboration worked.

Indie spotlight: Christmas marketing opportunities

Indie spotlight is our monthly column on self-publishing. This month our regular columnist, Siobhan Daiko, who is herself an indie author, explains how Christmas presents many marketing opportunities, to those with a book to sell.