Looking Back at AFCC 2013

My second excursion to Singapore for the Asian Festival of Children's Content 2013 was a great deal more organised than the first in 2012. A big thank you to Kota Buku and the Singapore Book Council for arranging everything - transport and lodging especially. And I wasn't alone this time - my daughter and several other delegates, including Razin Abdul Rahman senior manager at Kota Buku, illustrator/artist Yusof Gajah and his wife, Zakiah; and authors Teoh Choon Ean and Ain Maisarah, were on the same bus. Ean handed be a leaflet announcing The Calistro Prize - 'Celebrating the creation of Malaysian stories for Malaysian children and teenagers.' Interested? Go to www.calistroprize.wordpress.com

So how was AFCC 2013? This year, I actually had an agenda in mind and a whole list of people to meet. I also needed to recce the venue because the Conference was being held at the National Library - an enormous building compared to the cosy colonial style Old Parliament House which served as the venue last year.

The big news first: The Hedwig Annuar Book Award (HABA) went to Edmund Lim, author of Where's Grandma and Tan Zixi, illustrator. The SingTel Asian Picture Book Award (SAPBA) was awarded to two different books: Debra Chong, author of If I Were; and Baasansuren Bolormaa, illustrator of  Old City. The talented Baasansuren Bolormaa is from Mongolia. I believe the AFCC is going to be the platform to discover new talent from all over Asia.

Illustration from 'Old City' by Baasansuren Bolormaa 

However, the shock was the fact that the Scholastic Asia Book Award (SABA) was not awarded this year. Alas - rumour has it that there were no submissions. Perhaps the requirement for six hard copies was too daunting... Ean and I both decided that we will not fail to make a submission this time around. SABA 'recognises children's writers of Asian origin and their efforts to celebrate Asian life and experiences, and share them with the rest of the world.' For more info: www.scholasticbookaward.asia or afcc.com.sg

The first talk I attended 'YA - A Malaysian Perspective' featured Teoh Choon Ean and Golda Mowe. Ean talked about the steps she followed to write a YA fiction in two weeks flat! Known as the 'uncrowned queen of short stories,' she admitted that she is also known as the 'lazy writer' because she only writes when there is a prize to be won! According to Ean, the important points to consider when writing Fiction are: Character, Plot, Setting, Theme and Style. In YA literature, style is subordinate to the story-telling i.e. when it comes to word smithing vs telling a good story, the latter always wins (a good case in point being the Twilight saga. However, the Hunger Game books have both style and great plot) So what goes into the YA novel? Fast-paced plotting; the plot is the story structure. The theme often focuses on the challenges of youth - the writer needs to be aware that a young adult is facing certain situations or events for the first time in his/her life. We also need to consider the inspiration for a story. Apparently, her observation that "teenagers live their lives as if they have the nine lives of a cat" led to her first YA novel. She wove nine separate short stories into a novel called Nine Lives using an umbrella concept which linked them. Being more comfortable with short stories myself, I find this idea could be put to good use. According to Ean, a survey in 2005 revealed that Malaysians above the age 10 read only two books a year, which was the same figure in 1995. 

http://www.gmowe.ws/IbanDream.html

Golda Mowe, the author of Iban Dream, talked about her struggles to write and publish her book - a process, we are told which took five years! One of the major obstacles she faced was her own mastery of the English language; she realised that ESL (English as a Second Language) was not enough and she needed to acquire First Language proficiency - which she did, undoubtedly.  Iban Dream was finally published by Singapore-based Monsoon Books and she was the only Malaysian author to have a book launch at AFCC 2013. I admit to feeling slightly alarmed that her book was also based on legendary Sarawak and there seemed to be parallel plot lines to The Jugra Chronicles. But since I started reading it, I think they are completely different. Golda, being of Iban descent, herself has an insider's understanding of Iban culture. One of the fascinating thinga she mentioned in her talk is the papan turai. Apparently it is a storyboard (in the literal sense, made of wood), used to pass down knowledge, history, customs, myths and legend to the next generation. And reading her book is like being immersed in the legendary Sarawak of old, where gods and demons walk among men. Her writing style is quite intricate and literary; and she writes about tribal practices like animal sacrifices and head-hunting without flinching  - as I said, she is fearless! Although Iban Dream is being positioned as a YA novel, I feel it verges on full-fledged Adult Fiction.

Talking about adult fiction, it appears that Malaysia is finally on the world literary map. Malaysian author, Tan Twan Eng not only garnered the Man Asian Literary award early this year for his book, The Garden of Evening Mists, he was also awarded the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, for the same book last week. While celebrating his success, Facebook friends felt that the book could have been better conceived - the setting in Japanese-occupied Malaya in WWII, was a bone of contention in particular.

Grandma Lim's Persimmon is a Malaysian-published book which debuted at AFCC 2013. Authored by Singapore-based Sunita Bhamray and illustrated by South African Marjorie van Heerden, this charming picture book, published by Linda Tan Lingard's Oyez!Book represents a multi-national effort. Linda, who is also a literary agent as well as a publisher, talked about marketing and selling the rights to your book internationally during her session 'Marketing Your Books and Selling Rights - How a literary agent can help you.



Back to Malaysian Speakers at AFCC 2013 - Next came Ain Maisarah and her Pink brand of books. All her books used to have pink covers and the titles usually start with 'Aku mahu...' (I want ...) being targeted towards the chick lit market. Ain Maisarah has been described as a publishing phenomenon, having book sales in six digit figures (book sales in these numbers are rare in Malaysia). She embodies her image in person too - I noticed on the bus that she was carrying two pairs of expansive looking pink stiletto high-heeled shoes in a plastic bag by hand. I normally cram all my shoes into my suitcase...

Ain Maisarah and her husband own their own publishing company and recently rebranded her books as Blink (Blue + Pink) when they decided to expand their market to include boys. I also observed that Ain Maisarah had something in common with best-selling Singapore author Adeline Foo (The Dairy of Amos Lee) - they are both charming and spoke in soft, almost girlish voices - could this be the secret of their success? (Wink!)

Can you see me now?

The highlight of AFCC 2013 was of course Malaysia Night, the inaugural Cultural night which celebrates the AFCC Country of focus. A group of students from Sekolah Seni Johor (Johor Art School), in bright colourful costumes, put up a dance drama based on Jainal Amambing's book, The Proud Butterfly and the Strange Tree. The guest of honour was HRH Raja Zarith Sofia, a noted children's book author and gifted illustrator herself. Emilia Yusof, the guest illustrator for AFCC 2012, presented her with an original painting of her story book character. Emila Yusof was the guest illustrator for AFCC 2013.

I managed to meet up with both Marjorie Coughlan and Corrine Robson from www.papertigers.org Surprising fact: even though Papertigers.org is based in San Francisco, Marjorie is British and lives in York, UK while Corrine is based in Vancouver, Canada. Apparently, there is an office in San Francisco which maintains the website (which is fantastic). Marjorie presented a paper on the fine art of reviewing children's books while Corrine is on the Project Splash! Asia committee. I had tried to get Eight Treasures of the Dragon included in the Project Splash! Asia anthology by Kenneth Quek, AFCC Festival informed me that it was too late as the booklet was already in print.

Also spoke to two extraordinary story-tellers: Kamini Ramachandran and Rosemarie Somaiah. Both are riveting speakers and have compelling presence. If you need a spokesperson to front your campaign - hire a storyteller! Another surprise, Kamini was born and raised in Malaysia. My daughter bought a copy of Rosemarie's book The Never Mind Girl and other stories. Kamini is contemplating writing a book based on the Ramayana, but I will not divulge anymore of her ideas here...

What else? Renee Ting,  President and Publisher of Shen's Books revealed  that out of 2,000-odd children's titles published in the US, less than 100 are Asian themed. She divided the books into 10 categories: Non-fiction, Folklore, Historical Fiction/Memior, Big Issues, Focus on Culture, Immigration/Emigration, First Generation hyphenated American, Multi-Ethnic, Ethinicity/Culture as Setting and Ethnicity as Non-Issue. Using this system, The Jugra Chronicles will probably fall into the Historical Fiction + Culture as Setting.

According to Renee, Asian themed children's books did not gain prominence until Grace Lin was awarded a Newbery Honour. She also mentioned that a successful book serves as a Mirror - where readers can relate to the characters or see themselves in it and/or serves as a Window - where readers look out into another world and see something new.

I heard from Ean that Vatsala Kaul Banerjee's talk 'Child's Play - Editing Children's Book' was really good. Unfortunately, I was late (attending a story-telling session by Rosemarie Somaiah) and was turned away at the door - apparently the room was packed, with people sitting on the floor! Vatsala Banerjee is the Publishing Director at Hachette India. Maybe I'll get Ean to guest blog about it.

Stunning cover illustration by Yusof Gajah

I could not miss Yusof Gajah's talk about his life and his art. He was quite an engaging and amusing speaker. He is one of those lucky people who achieved success early in life - he recalled seeing a poster with his art on it in the subway station in Tokyo. Apparently he couldn't help himself and had to take one of the posters home! He also won the Nami Concours (held on Nami Island, South Korea) with his first ever submission and is now a judge on the Nami panel. Yusof Gajah encouraged other illustrators to participate in similar contests to make a name for themselves. Yusof Gajah also participated in the Illustrations Review session at AFCC 2013 with author/illustrator Naomi Kojima and Shirin Yim Bridges.




Then the people I only get to meet once a year when we congregate for the AFCC - Linda Tan Lingard, Norhayati Razali, Daphne Lee, Salwah Shukor, Mohana Gill and Peter Duke. And old friends Gwen Smith and Tan Vay Fern were there too. I had a chat with fellow introvert, Salwah, about the difficulties of  standing out in a crowd. I also asked her how she coped in a profession where one is expected to be quite forceful (she is a lawyer). She said she preferred negotiations to going to court... Salwah and her friend, Roshni Menon, have their own publishing company, SmallPrint, which was apparently set-up because they could not bear the pain of rejection, at this point in their lives! SmallPrint's first publication is a little gem called Three Green Dreams, by Roshni Menon.

I also managed to chat with Daphne Lee, who mentioned that she is acquiring the rights for her books from MPH Publishing and plans to republish them. I asked her how she managed to accomplish this - she said she just had to ask them for it! Daphne, Marjorie Coughlan and Anushka Ravishankar participated in a session entitled Asian Themes in Children's Books.

The lovely people at my talk - I noticed an audible
sigh of relief when I mentioned that I was going to
post my paper online! 

So how did my talk go? Better than expected, considering my fear of public speaking. The attendance was better than expected too. Very grateful to Tan Sri Dr Asiah Abu Samah,  the Chairman of Kota Buku; Norhayati Razali, Dr Gwen Smith, Teoh Choon Ean, Tan Vay Fern and Golda Mowe for the support! Many thanks to Kenneth Quek for printing out my paper - I tend to forget my facts, occasionally. The moderator for my session, Ken McKenzie asked a pertinent question. He said he always had to struggle on "whether it was right to change/re-tell folklore, which may be considered sacred to the people they originated from, to make them relevant to young people today?"  I admitted that I went through a similar struggle when I first started re-telling folktales. Where the stories really what the original storyteller (panglipur lara in Malay) intended or something which I made up? But in the end, I had to do it of course. But I think Kamini Ramachandran had the right answer - she said that 'you honour the stories you right about." Absolutely, we honour the stories by keeping them interesting and alive for a new generation; otherwise they will just fade away.

After my talk, I made a dash for the Women's Restroom. Came to a complete standstill when I entered the doorway and saw men ... I wondered, perplexed, "Why are all these MEN in the Women's Restroom?" A voice in my head said, "Duh, you're in the Men's Restroom!" I turned around and dashed out and made a beeline for the Women's Restroom next door!

Asian Festival of Children's Content (AFCC 2013), Singapore

An email from Kota Buku ('Book City' in English) confirmed that I will be presenting a paper at the AFCC 2013 Writers and Illustrators Conference in Singapore on Tuesday, 28 May! Of course, I've known about this all along; after all I spent a couple of weeks researching and writing a paper for the Conference. But it was nice receiving the confirmation all the same. Many thanks to Linda Tan Lingard, who alerted me that Kota Buku was looking for speakers for AFCC 2013.

I feel all the more honoured by the fact that the country of focus this year is Malaysia. The AFCC is organised by the National Book Development Council of Singapore. It started out as the Asian Children's Writers and Illustrators Conference about a decade ago but expanded its scope into the Asian Festival of Children's Content in 2010. This new platform created a buzz in the regional children's book circle  and that's when I first heard about it. For more information, please go to afcc.com.sg or www.papertigers.org/wordpress/tag/2013-afcc/

I attended the AFCC last year (refer to my post, Asian Festival of Children's Content 2012) on an impulse but it was worth all the last minute arrangements. Apart from the talks, lectures and workshops, it is an amazing platform for networking. You actually meet editors from Scholastic, Little Brown, Hachette, Harper Collins as well as local publishers face-to-face. Not surprisingly, I met Norhayati Razali, Manager of Kota Buku at AFCC 2012. Kota Buku is a government-linked organisation set up to invigorate the book publishing industry in Malaysia); the organisation visits most of the major international book fairs (Bologna & Frankfurt) to promote Malaysian books. Must not forget to mention that Malaysia Night is on 27 May and will feature traditional dances and even a theatre.

This year's participants will include Yusof Gajah, a Malaysian artist/illustrator known for his iconic elephant drawings and paintings ('Gajah' means elephant in Malay); bestselling author Ain Maisarah (must find out the secret of her success!), talented illustrator Emila Yusof and prize-winning author Teoh Choon Ean. I'm also keen to meet, John McKenzie, Principal Lecturer at the University of Canterbury College of Education from New Zealand, who will be the moderator for my talk and Naomi Kojima, a well known illustrator who is also a Facebook friend. Will also catch up with Daphne Lee, Malaysian author/teacher/editor/columnist; Tan Vay Fern, an illustrator I collaborated with on two of my books and of course old friends Gwen Smith and Mohana Gill. Best of all, my publisher MPH Publishing will be bringing over books to the AFCC 2013. Last year, Marshall Cavendish arranged for copies of Timeless Tales of Malaysia to be sent to the venue, more or less at the last minute.

I've added more people on my 'must meet' list: Marjorie Coughlan and Corinne Robson from papertigers.org  Paper Tigers is a website devoted to books for young readers. It embraces multiculturalism, with a particular focus on the Pacific Rim and South Asia. Also Sue Flotow from SCBWI Singapore; Jayapriya Vasudevan, co-owner of the Jacaranda Literary Agency; Dayan De Silva,

Kamini Ramachandran 

publisher/owner of Saga Seed Books from Malaysia and Kamini Ramachandran, a professional storyteller from Singapore. She is the co-founder of Moon Shadow Stories - an organisation which seeks to restore the lost art of the oral narrative tradition for adults.

And must not forget to say hello to Kenneth Quek, the Festival Director and Dr Myra Garces Bacsal, Programme Director of AFCC Writers and Illustrators Conference.

And my subject of choice?  Adapting Asian Folklore as a Basis for Children's and YA Literature. Hmm... should I have picked a more current, edgy and market-oriented topic?

The abstract of my paper:


ADAPTING ASIAN FOLKLORE AS A BASIS 
FOR CHILDREN’S AND YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE

ABSTRACT

The paper starts by examining how folktales have been incorporated as an integral part of the plot in certain children’s and YA books and also on the influence of Asian folklore in a number of YA books. References will be made to C.S. Lewis (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe), Alan Garner (The Owl Service), Ruth Manley (The Plum Rain Scroll, The Dragon Stone and Peony Lantern) and Grace Lin (Where the Mountain Meets the Moon).

As research is a key factor in writing a good book, we look at sources for Asian folktales e.g. unpublished stories on the internet, newspaper articles and also books, old and new. Research for a book should not just focus on one particular folktale but also on similar stories and variants of the story.

Supporting research on the time and place which form the backdrop to the story i.e. details such as old place names, historical personages and cultural practices give the book texture and context. Reference will be made to The Jugra Chronicles: Miyah and the Forest Demon in this section. 

The need to re-interpret and retell these folktales, to make them relevant and appealing to a young contemporary readership is the third key point. The author needs to balance authenticity (being true to the story) with the need to hold the readers’ interest.

Finally, the paper examines the pervasiveness of certain folktales throughout Asia to show the underlying unity in diversity.  For example, The Tanjung Blossom Faerie is a story of seven faerie sisters (retold in Timeless Tales of Malaysia) who descend to earth to take a bath in a beautiful forest pool. The youngest sister loses her cloak and is unable to return home. A traditional Malay folktale, this story appears in folktales from Japan, Korea and China as The Weavermaid and the Herdsboy. Even more surprising, this same motif of seven faerie sisters appears in an Iban legend called Jelenggai (retold in Timeless Tales of Malaysia).

Asian Festival of Children's Content (AFCC 2012), Singapore

On 31 May 2012, I took the express bus to Singapore to attend the Asian Festival of Children's Content. It was a lucky confluence of events that brought me to Singapore -  we were required to fly from Zagreb to KL 'post-haste' in mid-May when I received an email from Tan Vay Fern about the Asian Festival of Children's Content which was only two weeks away! The venue was The Arts House, which was quite close to Chinatown. So I registered online, booked a room at The Inn at Temple Street and got the return bus ticket to Singapore.

In Chinatown - photo courtesy of Tan Vay Fern. We had fatty crabs for dinner at the restaurant in the background!

As I haven't visited Singapore for at least 15 years (we lived in Singapore from 1992 - 1995 and my daughter was born there), I was truly impressed with the changes I saw. It wasn't the ultra-modren architecture or the orderly streets - it was the greenery everywhere and the lack of pollution and congestion. Even modren high-rise buildings had terraces with flowering plants and some had roof gardens or even had climbing plants covering their walls! I had heard about their famous tagline - 'the garden city' - but I didn't think they could turn it into a reality.

Hard to believe, but I met Vay Fern in person for the very first time in Chinatown, Singapore! Although we had collaborated on Eight Treasures of the Dragon, it was entirely via email. I had heard of her before and knew that she was a young and successful illustrator, with at least eight children's books published to date. After a lot of walking along the colourful and busy Temple Street, we decided to have fatty crabs at a nearby restaurant for dinner. I had forgotten how scrumptious fatty crabs could be!

The last two days of the AFCC, which took place at The Arts House was exciting, mainly because I got to meet people I've only known on Facebook. The talks were great too but I noticed that some of the speakers used it as a platform to promote their own books rather than impart information/tips and a few were only recently published. I was also agrieved by the fact that there was no wifi at the venue! But the fact that it was being held at a historic building - the former Parliament  of Singapore -made it quite special.

The AFCC was a great opportunity to network - there were old friends like Dr Gwen Smith, and acquintances like Linda Tan Lingard (from the Yusof Gajah Lingard literary agency) and Daphne Lee (author/columnist/editor at Scholastic Malaysia). And people I met for the first time: Yusof Gajah, celebrated illustrator of children's books and his wife Zakiah; Teoh Choon Ean, the only author I know who actually makes money from writing books (in English); Quek Sue Yian, young and talented author of 'Khailash', a picture-book about a refugee zebra, illustrated by Khairul Azmir Shoib (Sue had a book launch and I bought a signed copy of  Khailash, ); Mohana Gill, award-winning author of  cookbooks,Vegemania and Fruitistic, and the 'Hayley' cook books for children; Naomi Kojima, a well known illustrator from Japan who bought a copy of my book 'Timeless Tales of Malaysia':); illustrator Isabel Roxas, Cecilia de la Campa from Writers House Inc; Sayoni Basu from Harper Collins India; Tarie Sabido, (an FB friend whi didn't recognise me) and a blogger from the Philippines; Salwah Abdul Shukor, a lawyer whose dream job is to write children's books; Denise Tan from Bookaburra (what a brilliant name for a book store); Shobna Janardanan from ASTRO, Rafilda Rahman from the SCBWI Malaysia; and last but not least Norhayati Razali from the Malaysian Book Council.

The highlight for me was the dinner at the penthouse of the National Library -great company, great food and what a view! Will I attend the AFCC again? For sure, especially as they are going to focus on Malaysia in 2013!