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“Time Will Pass Johnny” by Percy Herbert
For anyone who grew up on British and Hollywood war films of the 1950s to the 1980s, Percy Herbert’s face is instantly familiar even if his name is not. He turns up in The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Guns of Navarone, The Wild Geese and dozens of others: the reliable “oh, that guy”…
“The Manila Poker Club” by Mark Sy
In the 1930s, up to 20,000 European Jews turned to Asia for refuge before Japan entered the war as an…
“The British Indian Ocean Territory: A Secret and Strategic Cold War History” by Samuel Bashfield
The British Indian Overseas Territory is the sort of place only a stamp-collector will have heard of. It’s more commonly…
“Music Sets You Free / How Many More Times Will I Watch the Full Moon Rise?” by Ryuichi Sakamoto
First published in Japan in 2009, then followed by a second volume in 2023 written in the shadow of a…
“My Neighbour, The Dictator” by Tari Lang
The years immediately following Indonesian independence were optimistic ones. The early 1950s are remembered as the “parliamentary period” of pluralism,…
“Rising China, Chinese Cultural and its Transformation in Southeast Asia”
The rise of China as a global superpower, and the myriad impacts of “rising China” on Southeast Asia have energised a sizeable volume of scholarly literature and punditry. Singapore’s Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS)-Yusof Ishak Institute—one of the leading think tanks in Southeast Asia—has made notable efforts in explaining these impacts, especially in relation…
“Taiwan Travelogue” by Yang Shuang-zi
The winner of the 2026 International Booker Prize (and the 2024 US National Book Award for Translated Literature) is a piece of faux Japanese travel-writing, framed with an equally faux publication history. Aoyama Chizuko, an entirely fictional Japanese writer, travels to Japanese-occupied Taiwan in 1938 on an official lecture tour. After the War, her contemporaneous…
“The Final Six” by Akinari Asakura
A prestigious IT company sets six job finalists, all fresh out of university, an unusual task: through a group discussion,…
“What’s a Snow Leopard to You?” by Chen-Fu Hsu
Chen-Fu Hsu, a Taiwanese writer interested in bugs, photography and geography, traveled to Tibet to gain first-hand experience with snow…
“She Walks at Night” by Seishi Yokomizo
She Walks at Night is the eighth Seishi Yokomizo mystery to be published in English since 2019 and features a…
“This is Where the Serpent Lives” by Daniyal Mueenuddin
In This is Where the Serpent Lives, Daniyal Mueenuddin unpacks the nuances of the Pakistani landowning class through rich, in-depth…
“Patchwork Dolls” by Ysabelle Cheung
In the title story of Ysabelle Cheung’s debut story collection Patchwork Dolls, the narrator Sophia and her childhood friends sell bits of their bodies so they can pay down their student loans, start businesses and afford luxuries. Mahika had sold her deep-set eyes, her nose, her dimples, her lips; Jumana her sharp, symmetrical cheekbones; and…
“Snakes of Singapore: A Slightly Unhinged Field Guide” by Juliette Yu-Ming Lizeray
Meet Singapore’s strangest inhabitants. The snake that cartwheels. The snake that clones itself. The snake that flies through the air. Snakes are everywhere in Singapore, gliding through mangroves, sunning on…
“My Wild City: Finding Nature, Meaning, and Hope in India’s Capital” by Neha Sinha
In My Wild City, acclaimed nature writer Neha Sinha takes us on an unforgettable journey through the hidden wildernesses of the bustling metropolis of Delhi, India, where she finds as…
“Chinese Media Improvisations” by Xuenan Cao
Xuenan Cao offers an unexpected angle on China’s technological rise, spotlighting the role of deficit-driven improvisation. As Cao demonstrates, where printing paper, computers, and microchips have been in shortage, media…
“Stormy Seas” by Thung-Hong Lin
How can a small democracy resist the influence of a powerful authoritarian neighbor? Taiwan is frequently praised for its successful economic development and peaceful transition to democracy, serving as a…
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