Book-Killers Of The Amazon Jungle?

Several years ago, I noted a news report that claimed anti-climate change trolls tried to sabotage sales of a book on climate change using one- or two-star Amazon reviews. I can't remember the details now as I forgot to save the link to the report or the book in question.

But I guess after Hurricane Sandy, a lot more people are thinking, "Come to think of it, our summers have been warmer lately...".

Now, another book is being threatened by an even greater, more insidious force: Michael Jackson fans.

From a 'speed read' of Randall Sullivans' book, Untouchable is largely sympathetic towards the late King of Pop and not nearly as kind to his siblings. The usual advice when it comes to such books is the best: take it with a pinch of salt. Or, as Michiko-san puts it: "Fans of Jackson's talent ... would be way better off viewing that documentary — or YouTube clips of the Motown show — than reading this bloated and thoroughly dispensable book."

But you know how some MJ fans are.

A group of such fans claimed credit for the rush of one-star Amazon reviews of Untouchable, sales of which seem to be buckling under all the negativity thrown its way. Out of the 16,000 copies distributed, only 3,000 were reportedly sold. One of the people behind this campaign said it was a "moral responsibility" to make sure the book tanks.

I'd like to believe that it was more due to the negative reviews by more mainstream voices. A reviewer in the LA Times, for instance, called it "a joyless slog".

...Still, I can't help but compare these guys to the so-called defenders of the US Constitution's Second Amendment. Especially when their actions seem driven by emotion and unfounded assumptions that something they hold dear is being threatened.

"Books used to die by being ignored, but now they can be killed — and perhaps unjustly killed," said Cornell sociologist Trevor Pinch, who studied reviews on Amazon, in The New York Times.

These days, we probably shouldn't expect or assume that objective, hardcore journalism is the sole reason behind the release of celebrity biographies, especially those that revolve around controversial personalities such as Jackson. But what about books that should be read? Books that are written by credible authors quoting unimpeachable sources?

Feelings about a book is part of a review. When a 'review' is mostly feelings or conjecture without the backing of fact or elaboration, it's just opinion, to be taken even more lightly than an 'actual' review.

Far from a show of solidarity for a maligned idol or "moral responsibility" in action, the negative campaign against Sullivan's Untouchable seems to confirm the possibility that the fate of a book - and to an extent, a writer's livelihood - can be determined via remotely directed mob justice.

Certain parties who are not fond of things found in books they don't like, even if it's just a paragraph, line or even a single word can now bury it, perhaps forever, with emotion-fuelled rants and falsehoods spread online by people who believe only what they want to believe.

As if there's not enough trouble already out there that keeps writers and publishers up at night.

So what if Randall Sullivan did get some things right or wrong in that book? How much does that matter now? Jackson's gone. One might not be able to libel the dead, but for Sullivan's career to be threatened or possibly ended by an angry virtual mob is also an injustice itself.

If the worst happens, will anyone claim 'moral responsibility' for the death of a writer's career?

Amazon can look away and pray this mess away, but if it's serious about making the product comments section a viable feedback tool, it needs to find ways to keep the trolls out. Too many comment threads out there resemble the insides of a chamber pot, and it won't be too long before Amazon's will be equally useless.

After all, wasn't Amazon set up to sell stuff in the first place?

News: Some Author Updates, Books and Obscure Punctuation

So Imran Ahmad spoke about his book yesterday at MPH 1Utama, and it was all right, even though lack of space limited the amount of seats. Some signed copies of the book should still be available at the outlet.

The 'perfect gent' holds court at MPH, 1Utama. And no,
this blog has not become "The Imran Ahmad Show".

And dear G*d, he's lost weight. 30lbs, I was told.

The Readings @ Seksan's event celebrates its eighth birthday this weekend on 26 January, from 3:30pm to 6pm. Writers scheduled to appear include Imran, Marina Mahathir and Eeleen Lee, with Bluetoffee Press editor and New Village zine publisher See Tshiung Han as the emcee.

Also: Boey Cheeming's When I Was A Kid is on its fifth reprint. Sales may soon reach - if not pass - the 10,000 mark.

Elsewhere:

• German publisher gets flak for cutting racist terms from classic children's book.
• Dear Abby ... RIP.
• Some reasons why print books will never die.
• Is there any pleasure in reading "repulsive" writers? And can chick lit be bad for your health?
• "To Lord Byron, from the author." An autographed copy of the original Frankenstein emerges from the past.
• Some juicy bits from Lawrence Wright's Scientology exposé Going Clear. Apparently, "the secrets" came to L Ron Hubbard while he was under anaethesia during dental surgery - if only half of us were as lucky.
• Imagine that: Facebook updates are more "mind-ready" than polished prose. Does this explain the slow death of literature?
• "In the English-speaking world, punning is viewed as more of a tic than a trick, a pathological condition whose sufferers are classed as 'compulsive', 'inveterate' and 'unable to help themselves'." Are puns that bad?
• Too good not to share: links to free e-book formatting and marketing guides, including the user manual for e-book conversion tool Calibre. And turn a blog into an e-blook with the Ebook Glue webapp.
• What do book editors want in 2013? More non-fiction, from the looks of it. Will it be bad years for fiction from here on?
• Eleven common words we're probably mispronouncing. For me, that's more than half the list and, goodness, "boatswain" equals "bo'sun"! Can we have, like, eleven more?
• Two spaces after a fullstop? Wrong, wrong, wrong. I think this has been posted on Slate before. And by golly, I didn't know there were these obscure punctuation marks for doubt, irony, authority and sarcasm.

Go West, Young Man

I had difficulty containing myself when reviewing this book. When you go through and correct a lot of bad stuff in your job, a good read will make you shed tears of joy.

I thought I did rather well, until a colleague noted that I was like a "little boy salivating over an ice cream". Urrrgh, there goes my cred....

There seems to be some confusion over the book's publication date and number of pages. The copy I got lists the date as 2012, while the web sites say 2013; the information in the inset near the bottom is from the review copy (not an ARC). The book is the same - just hope the differences aren't too big.

...Now I want ice cream. Vanilla.

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When a young man went west

first published in The Malaysian Insider, 17 January 2013


I suspect that, post 9/11, memoirs of people from a certain demographic were pretty hot items. But one of those had been rejected ― not because the author wrote it himself, but it was not a "miserable" book.

"It's not supposed to be miserable...!" the author said exasperatedly in an immaculate British accent when talking about it several years back.

Maybe it's because the author turned out to be a perfect gentleman.

The last I'd heard of Imran Ahmad, he was an executive at General Electric. So I was surprised to learn that he's now residing in KL, and he's released a US/international edition of said "not miserable" memoir Unimagined and went on another book tour in America.

This edition, The Perfect Gentleman: A Muslim Boy Meets The West, has been updated with newer material and since it's been ages since I've looked at the older UK edition, it still feels fresh.

Each chapter is made up of what I'd call episodes, many of which are paragraphs of 10 lines or less. All events are in chronological order, making it easy to follow his life's journey. It feels as if one's reading a Tumblr account. The pages zip by quickly.

Some of the new bits include a brief story about how his parents met, and the day he was born ― Day Zero, as he calls it. "...I took my time in arriving (a trait I still exhibit sometimes) and I emerged in the early hours of–" ... No. If you want to send him birthday greetings, read the book.

In spite of the racism he grew up with as a Pakistani immigrant in Britain, Imran recalls his past in a generally frank and upbeat manner. The narration, so English it almost tastes of Earl Grey, made the funny parts laugh-out-loud and the sad parts even more poignant.

It also conveys his thoughts of each past self as he makes sense of the world around him. When "blatant nepotism" robbed him of the title of Karachi's Bonniest Baby, you can almost visualise one-year-old Imran, looking all dapper in his suit, thinking to himself that, yes, this was the beginning of "my lifelong struggle against corruption and injustice."

What a struggle. Growing up in London, he faced the prejudices of the day because of his religion and nationality; to one's dismay, things haven't changed much since then.

Bullying, unrequited love, uppity schoolteachers, being unjustly scolded and feelings of validation when scoring top marks or appearing in the newspaper (I had no such luck) and the like... it all jogs your own memories even as Imran recounts his.

His resolve to fit in and battle the prejudices of his schoolmates by becoming "whiter than white" raises a pang of pity, because by right one shouldn't have to, but I guess it's an unfair world out there and the young, without the benefit of experience, tend to judge books by their covers.

What I suspect will be of interest is Imran's ruminations over culture and religion ― that of others and his own. As a young man, he wondered where justice was when a presumably Muslim renter left his parents an "astronomical phone bill" ("Does not his heart tremble with fear at the thought of God's judgment?").

He draws parallels between aspects of his culture and that of Mr Spock's ("Like Muslims and other Asians, Vulcans have arranged marriages, and are not given to displays of emotion in public.").

Some of his observations are darkly hilarious in hindsight. The 1978 Black Friday incident in Iran, for one, was an awful time, and "confusing" for him because the Shah who instigated the event was installed by the CIA.

"The role of America in this is very disturbing, since America is one of the forces of good in the world. They probably didn't know anything about the torture." Am I the only one who cracks up at stuff like that?

If there was anything in the book I didn't like, I didn't notice. Some, however, will find it a bit long-winded (his life was eventful, maybe?), a little self-absorbed (it's his life story), too preachy in parts (perhaps, but it's still fun), and uses too many italics (what).

The book, it seems, was banned in Qatar due to the religious and cultural bits (everybody's a critic). Looks like it's shaping up to be one of those "love it or hate it" kind of reads.

Still, I can't help liking it. The wit, introspection and interrogation of his motives and those of others are fun to read (Former Waterstone's bookbuyer turned publisher Scott Pack loved it and I tend to pay attention to his book recommendations, never mind what some have said about him. And, as shown previously, he's quotable. If I extract any more I'd be infringing copyright big time.


The KL launch of Imran Ahmad's The Perfect Gentleman will be on Saturday, 19 January at MPH 1Utama, from 3pm to 4pm, and Tuesday, 22 January at Kinokuniya KLCC, from 6pm to 7pm.

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The Perfect Gentleman

A Muslim Boy Meets the West

Imran Ahmad
Center Street (2012)
336 pages
Non-fiction
ISBN: 978-1-4555-2854-7

News: Fisking Online Trolls, And Various Miscellany

It seems Robert Fisk has had enough of the "digital poison" spewed by "gutless" anonymous Internet trolls.

"Anonymity on the Net is as pathetic as the anonymous 'sources' that have contaminated the gutless journalism of the New York Times or CNN or the BBC for decades. And the innocent must be able to seek redress in cyberspace as well as in print. Poison-pen letters are illegal. ... So why should we be forced to drink poison on the Net?"

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A Tumblr of lousy book covers are such a hoot, as is this blog about lousy Polish book covers. The cover for this book (G*d, Amazon will sell anything) is strangely compelling, and if that's not a big enough red flag, there's the book description and author background. Oh, and here's a blog about very bad sci-fi/fantasy novel covers.

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"I had no idea. LITERALLY no idea that bananas could be sliced. For MY ENTIRE LIFE I have simply peeled and chewed bananas. BUT NOW...NOW...I can have my bananas SLICED. perfect little banana discs!!!!"

Love the Amazon review comedy around the Chef'n Bananza Banana Slicer.


In other news:

• A new law in Turkey quietly lifts ban on 23,000 books. It's always the lifting of bans that are done so quietly ... unless it's an election year, perhaps.
• Author dumps "bullying" publisher over e-book royalties and starts his own publishing house - which also sells his own books, of course. Speaking of 'bad' publishers: Is Edmund Curll (c. 1675–1747) the worst publisher of all time?
• Abandoned Ship, a book on a honeymooning couple's nightmare after the Costa Concordia capsized.
• Keep your highlighter - it doesn't help you learn. Try flash cards and recall instead. Some of the best and worst learning techniques, outlined.
• Here are three books said to explore the delights of the indie bookstore. Now that's an idea: stories - fiction or non-fiction - revolving around small bookshops. That would make an interesting collection.
• Christopher Tolkien thinks Peter Jackson and company "eviscerated" his dad's book. So, not everybody is fond of the LoTR movies.
• It's that time of the year again: the hunt for the 2013 Hatchet Job of the Year. As expected, Zoë Heller's takedown of Joseph Anton is there, and Ron Charles's scathing review of Martin Amis's Lionel Asbo. It'll be a long wait for the results.
• It seems UK publisher Transworld has dropped Going Clear, Lawrence Wright's book on Scientology. Was the potential for legal tussles with the notoriously litigious group too much to think about?
• "...it's an uneasy business, reading a friend's book." When a friend writes a novel, how should you handle the disappointment?
• The poetry of Pablo Neruda, as 'read' by cats. And here are some bookstore cats, cat-alogued. Another reason why bookstores shouldn't close.
• In Mumbai, book piracy is not only socially acceptable, some Indian authors "see it as a stamp of mass popularity." Not sure what that means to the child pedlars who hawk these books.
• Research suggests racial bias rooted in lazy thinking, makes people closed-minded and less creative. Well, DUH.

The Bookstore Chain's Fix(i)

In the apparent slow death of Barnes and Noble, Dennis Johnson, founder of book blog MobyLives, and co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House, sees the karmic fate of commercial volume booksellers who're said to have crowded out the small-time players.

He notes that within 30 days, B&N has shuttered many of its US outlets. He's not sorry to see it go, but he's not happy with this development because, he argues, major bookstores such as Barnes and Noble also happen to be 'book showrooms' where people can preview books before buying them online; should such bookstores close, sales of e-books will also suffer, resulting in a domino effect that will hit every part of the industry.

So who'll fill the void left behind by the megastores? Indies, maybe or online distributors ... anything that doesn't squash a small business every time it rolls over. Besides, you don't need these companies to sell books these days. When author Joe Simpson felt bullied by his publisher over e-book royalties, he started his own publishing house - which also sells his own books, of course.

At home, local Malay fiction publisher Fixi is having trouble getting its latest publications into another popular bookstore chain. Around August last year, it decided to keep two Fixi novels, Hilang ("Missing") and Murtad ("Apostate"), off its shelves due to objectionable content that includes coarse language and (possibly) references to human gonads.

(...y'know, an official ban on books like that would leave a lot of bookstores with many empty shelves...)

But it seems that these were not the only Fixi books it had problems with.

Last December (not too long ago), this chain seems to have stopped taking four of Fixi's latest. Attempts by the publisher to contact the management have failed, and they're wondering why. Fourteen e-mails "in two years (between 10 December 2012 and 9 January 2013)", yo, and no official reply.

Later, Fixi released part three of this saga, which also throws a bunch of stats comparing online sales from their own web site and various book fairs with those from the chain, a rather long - and entertaining - way of saying, "No big loss, bro. We doin' fine on our own."

Fourteen e-mails and several Facebook nudges in two months may sound pushy, but at this day and age, a simple "Yes, we will" or "No, thank you" shouldn't be too hard to manage.

Perhaps this chain feels it doesn't need to explain its decision, or is it not convenient for them to explain? In light of the Borders employee's arrest over Irshad Manji's book, we probably shouldn't blame bookstores for being too cautious (a list of outlets carrying Fixi titles can be found here, or shop online at Fixi's web site).

Whatever the reasons, this bookstore (or rather, book-and-mostly-stationery store) chain didn't make itself look good by keeping quiet, and it no longer pays for corporations to be cold and aloof. Bookstores rely on people to keep them going, regardless of size, and these days the human connection is becoming a critical survival strategy.

The story (thus far) of Parnassus Books, which author Ann Patchett runs with former Random House sales rep Karen Hayes, is particularly inspiring, with regards to the founders' efforts and the community it's in, and how it appears to be bucking the trend that indie bookstores are dying.

"Amazon doesn't get to make all the decisions; the people can make them, by choosing how and where they spend their money," Patchett says. "If what a bookstore offers matters to you, then shop at a bookstore. If you feel that the experience of reading a book is valuable, then read a book. This is how we change the world: We grab hold of it. We change ourselves."

Some would argue that "it's only two years" and that, when it comes to the community spirit, we may be a long way from the folks at that corner of Nashville, Tennessee. But if there are more and more people out there supporting small presses like Fixi, perhaps the time when Malaysian publishers and bookstores can produce and sell what they (and not the powers that be) feel is all right won't be too far off.

News: Parnassus At Two, Sully Goes Indie, And Paying For Readings

"Anyone I mentioned this plan to was quick to remind me that books were dead, that in two years ... books would no longer exist, much less bookstores, and that I might as well be selling eight-track tapes and typewriters."

It's been two years since Ann Patchett and Karen Hayes's Parnassus Books opened, and it seems to be doing fine.

Patchett cites some reasons why this is, including just plain luck. "But this luck makes me believe that changing the course of the corporate world is possible," she adds. "Amazon doesn't get to make all the decisions; the people can make them, by choosing how and where they spend their money."

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Andrew Sullivan to split from The Daily Beast to go indie - subscription-based, of course. He also spoke to Salon regarding this move.

This move has sparked quite a bit of chatter in cyberspace; it's been discussed or talked about in TIME, SmartPlanet, and AmericaBlog, to name a few. John Scalzi put his two cents in, and wonders if he should do the same for Whatever (the answer is no).

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"Reading aloud is back in fashion"? How book readings may revive the storytelling traditions of yore. Plus, some advice on holding a fun readings. And from way back in 2011, some thoughts on writers and their brands, and whether bookstores holding readings should charge for admission.

Considering how glum things seem to be for bookstores, libraries, etc, maybe that's not such a bad idea. Paid admissions to readings imply a line-up so good, you have to pay to watch them live; people pay to watch artistes and musicians perform live, don't they? For the hosting venue, it's an additional income stream. And attendees, I think, would feel a little better supporting an event with their wallets than just showing up.

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The most popular literary tweet of 2012 is:

Harry Potter inspired an entire generation. But apparently that isn't good enough for the #Oscars.

Professor Snape @_Snape_ • 27/02/2012

Elsewhere:

• The KL launch for Imran Ahmad's The Perfect Gentleman will be at MPH 1Utama on Saturday, 19 January at 3-4pm and Kinokuniya KLCC on Tuesday, 22 January at 6-7pm. This book is the US/international edition of Unimagined, which was published in 2007; here's a bit of background on that book. This edition will include more material and an extended ending.
• Some rules for using hyphens. I found this useful as a reference and foundation for a personal style guide.
• Jungleland, the search for the fabled ruins of a "white city" in Central America. The author talks about it here.
• "In the name of the dead": Yang Jisheng's tombstone to victims of China's Great Famine. Meanwhile, Murong Xuecun (real name Hao Qun) asks, "What do Weibots think about China's Great Famine? " The 'answers' will shock.
• A year in literary criticism: a chat with author and critic Daniel Mendelsohn.
• Author JA Konrath has a long list of writer's resolutions for writerly folk, one of which is, "Get over yourself."
• This essential guide to dim sum by Carolyn Phillips on Buzzfeed's Lucky Peach is a great dim sum primer for the heavily Anglicised Chinese person.
• Girl power sweeps Costa Awards. O-kay.
• Fifty Shades trilogy to be read deeper at American University. O~kay....

A Kalamazoo Xmas Do

first published in The Malaysian Insider, 02 January 2013

Know that thing about people gaining weight during Christmas? It's true. I must've packed in several days' worth of calories in a single meal over at Café Kalamazoo.

Interior of Café Kalamazoo

Run by the god-brother of a friend of Melody's and his friends, its early days were fraught with danger. What were they thinking, planting themselves several doors down from the wildly popular Betty's Midwest Kitchen and offering a similar type of cuisine?

Melody and I didn't return until months later, after it underwent a revamp. Some grey walls were replaced with a cheerier theme, and the sign sported a more welcoming pastel yellow. It felt more like a hangout for close friends than a run-of-the-mill café.

The peanut butter and chocolate milkshake is so damn good

Missing the food they used to have during their days at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the restaurant's partners set up shop at Aman Suria to serve up the same, plus a bit more.

Fewer clues to their alma mater exist now than when they first opened; what remaining WMU memorabilia has been relegated to a yellow-painted section of a wall near the counter.

I can't say much about the burgers, but we were charmed by mains such as the cheese-drizzled pesto chicken and the hearty beef meatloaf.

One of the chefs, we were told, spent a great deal of time testing the sauces, and the results were great. Some thought had been put into the combination of dishes, sides and sauces.

Hearty, fall-off-the-bone ribs... a must-try at Kalamazoo

The peanut butter chocolate milkshake, more dessert than drink, had the effect of a nightcap and sedative on my perpetually strung, hyperactive nerves. A few sips and my shoulders slowly sagged in blissful submission to the sweet, nutty liquid ambrosia.

Some of these goodies, however, made way for a Christmas menu last weekend that included hand-picked regular items. Melody and I decided to skip the Christmas turkey, which she didn't like anyway. She went with "something light": a pork burger. I picked the Alabama BBQ Ribs and Chilli Cheese Fries.

The fries came first. American chilli "with a touch of heat", fries and cheese on a plate make for some heavy, tasty comfort food, but I felt it could use an additional three to four touches of heat. "Chilli" is such a misnomer for a dish whose main ingredients include tomato sauce, minced beef and pinto and/or kidney beans.

Beef meatloaf that makes you wanna sing ... ♪ and I would do
anything for love... ♫

My ribs arrived together with Melody's pork burger; the ETA for the food was faster than I'd expected. My burger fatigue hasn't quite run its course yet, so I gave it a pass — didn't even take a photo. She didn't say much, so I guess the burger's okay.

But oh G*d, the ribs. Pull-off-the-bone tender but not sticky, slathered in a runnier sauce dotted with herbs I couldn't identify. I got pumpkin mash, a sweeter and less filling side dish compared to potato that really made room for more.

I was still dipping into the chilli cheese fries between each rib bone, supplementing my plate of fries with the ones that came with Melody's burger. Once the rack o' ribs was no longer recognisable as such, the cutlery was cast aside in favour of fingers.

Her friend walked over to see a nearly clean plate with picked-clean bones; I'd wiped up the sauce and leftover bits with pieces of a burger bun Melody couldn't finish. She'd noted that any chef would be pleased to see me "enjoy myself so much". I certainly hoped so.

As a token of appreciation, Melody's friend brought us two pieces of marinated fried chicken from the kitchen to try. "Strictly staff fare," we were told. Nice, but a little heavy on the marinade.

And what a shame that both of us were too full for dessert, which included the cakes baked and supplied to Kalamazoo by Melody's friend's mom. The macadamia cake and Black Forest cake came highly recommended. The green tea and red bean cake we had on a previous visit was nice but dry — a glitch that they had pledged to fix.

Back home, the bathroom scales confirmed my worst fears: I'd gained the weight I'd lost pre-Christmas weekend.

Oh, what the heck. Eleven months at the gym and it'll all be gone.

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Café Kalamazoo

A-G-36, Jalan PJU 1/43
Aman Suria Damansara
47301 Petaling Jaya

CLOSED FOR GOOD