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Like any proper anthology of short fiction, Asian or not, this one is a celebration of, indeed a valentine to, the short story. One way we know we have read a great short story, as you will here again and again, is the recurrent, delicious mistake of feeling like we have actually just read an entire novel. Short stories are dense and compact; novels are, by definition, loose and baggy. To read a short story in one sitting, as we are so tempted to do here, is to have the artistic equivalent of expanding a compressed computer file: so much life comes pouring out, jack-in-the-box or clown-car style, of these meticulously crafted sentences and scenes. These brave, talented, unforgetable writers from the Philippines, Afghanistan, India, Japan and Singapore have compressed so much life, so much hard-fought wisdom, battered grace, and sweet delight, into these seventeen moving stories in alluring voices.


TBASS2022

The Best Asian Short Stories 2022 (Editor: Professor Darryl Whetter)

Brevity is the soul of wit, as William Shakespeare wrote in one of his longer plays, Hamlet. Flash Fiction, brief stories, have become one of the most exciting sub-genres of contemporary fiction. In This Will Only Take a Minute: Canadian Flash Fiction, Guernica Editions features short short stories by Canadian writers from six words to 500 words in length, short stories from across the entire spectrum of Canadian writing. and anything from stark realism to speculative fiction.

This Will Only Take A Minute: 100 Canadian Flashes (Edited by Bruce Meyer & Michael Mirolla)

This first-of-its-kind anthology showcases an array of the top poets (130 contributors) of this vast Asian region. The book contains the stylistically diverse Chinese poets Lian Yang, Liu Hongbin, Wang Ping and others who share a perspective on their homeland; the oriental touch of the Korean Chung Hee Moon and the Japanese Yosuke Tanaka; Maram al-Masri’s Franco- Syrian metaphors; Sholeh Wolpe’s Iranian-Americanisms, Rosa Jamali’s postcolonial lens on the Middle East; Nese Yasin’s bipolar/ binary Cypriot-Turk registers; politically urgent poetry from the Israeli-Palestinian region by Amir Or, Hava Pinhas-Cohen, Gili Haimovich and others; Paul Hetherington and Cassandra Atherton’s supple art of prose poetry lending a unique Australian colour and diction; the exploration of the rich American and British South Asian diaspora by Moniza Alvi, Vidyan Ravinthiran, Indran Amirthanayagam and Ahilan Packiyanathan; the irony of Kaiser Haq and romanticism of Aminur Rahman from Bangladesh; the magic of the Urdu/Hindustani cadence by India’s Gulzar and Javed Akhtar; Kunwar Narain’s wise philosophical Hindi diction; Adil Jussawalla’s ironic and sparse Mumbai cosmopolitanism and Jayanta Mahapatra deeply-rooted Oriyan metaphors. The signposts are just the tip of the iceberg, acting as a teaser and taste of what you will find inside this volume — in addition to the new/upcoming voices that make the book balanced and truly contemporary. Enjoy the rich and vibrant poetic landscape of Asia.

The Best Asian Poetry 2021-22 (Edited by Sudeep Sen)

Stories from this volume offer a rare glimpse into the lives of a diverse cross-section of the island-state’s residents, and invite us into their most intimate space—home.  Immigrants, migrants, expats, settled generations bring us into their bedrooms, balconies, kitchens and other spaces, their heartaches, traumas, dreams and desires. In so doing, they reshape their life experiences and their relationships with those whom they share their home.

The writers featured in this anthology include Isha B., Azeena Badarudeen, Ilya Katrinnada Binte Zubaidi, Arathi Devandran, Dia Feng-Lowe, Surinder Kaur, Ken Lye, Cecilia Mahendran, Gargi Mehra, Kalpana Mohan, Clara Mok, Payal Morankar, Vanessa Ng Q.R., Rolinda Onates Española, Anna Onni, Anjali Patil, Ranjani Rao, Aparna Das Sadhukhan, Euginia Tan, Audrey Tay and Phyllis Wong.

“A rare glimpse behind the politely but firmly closed doors of the Singaporean heartland, distinguished by its gathering of resident voices across nationalities, ethnicities and creeds,” said Alvin Pang, Ph.D., Poet and Editor, praising this remarkable anthology.

“These stories pack a punch by unpacking familiar themes through intimate scenes and surprising scenarios, regularly hitting too close to home,” remarked Cyril Wong, PhD, Poet & Fictionist, in appreciation of this this volume.

Felix Cheong, Poet and 2000 Young Artist Award (Literature), National Arts Council Singapore, found the anthology “a delightful mix of stories about home, homecoming, homing in on distances that build and separate us.”

About the Editors

Pallavi Narayan has worked in academia and book publishing in Singapore and India. She is a PhD in Literature and holds a Diploma in Creative Writing.

Iman Fahim Hameed has worked in academia in Singapore, is pursuing her MSc in Public Health, reports on global health issues for a UK-based charity, and writes poetry and vignettes.

Singapore At Home

Singapore At Home: Life Across Lines

Pre-order: Singapore At Home: Life Across Lines

The Best Asian Short Stories 2021, the latest in the annual TBASS series of anthologies, presents the Asian short story as a constantly evolving, innovative and vibrant mode of literary expression. Edited by Malachi Edwin Vethamani, Professor Emeritus, Nottingham University, this collection brings together the works of twenty Asian writers and writers residing in Asia, namely from Canada, India, Malaysia, Japan, Singapore, Philippines, United Kingdom and United States of America. The broad theme for this collection is the new normal, revolving around the Covid-19 pandemic, with the inclusion of other stories set in the Asian region. The stories on the new normal theme explore how this world-wide pandemic has impinged on private lives and the public world.

The authors whose stories have been selected for TBASS 2021 include Cyril Wong, Sudeep Sen, Elaine Chew, Danton Remoto, Ivy Ngeow, Bella Negi, Terence Toh, Roy Tristan B. Agustin, Bhaswati Gosh, Kiran Bhat, Christina Yin, Gankhu Sumnyan, Parvathi Nayar, Smita P Mukherjee, Susheela Menon, Andrew Innes, Vicky Chong, Donna Abraham Tijo, Namrata Singh, and Jose Varghese.

TBASS2021

The Best Asian Short Stories 2021

ISBN: 978-981-14-8042-3
Title: The Best Asian Short Stories 2020

From the mountains of Uttrakhand in India to the Rocky Mountain in Canada, the stories in this volume represent the multitude of Asian voices that capture the wishes, aspirations, dreams and conflicts of people inhabiting a vast region of our planet. While some contributions deal with the themes of migration, pandemics and climate change, others give us a peek into the inner workings of the human heart through the prism of these well-wrought stories. This volume is the expression of a community, "a community of Asian writing that stands on its own two – no, its own million – feet!", as novelist and critic Tabish Khair says in his 'Foreword'. 



The Best Asian Short Stories 2020

This is the second volume in the series, edited by Dr. Debotri Dhar, which contains well-crafted stories with innovative characters, gripping plots, diverse voices from 24 writers in 13 countries.

While Rakhshanda Jalil is a seasoned writer known to many in South Asia, Aditi Mehrotra is an aspiring Indian writer whose story delightfully juxtaposed textual passages and news clippings on women’s empowerment with everyday life vignettes of domesticity from small-town India. Martin Bradley’s story highlighted the intersecting themes of travel, historical memory, and communication across differences. Today, when latitudes shift, cultures collide, and we are all travellers in one form or another, in ways perhaps unprecedented, these stories must be told.

Contributors: 
Rakhshanda Jalil (India) Story title: ‘Diamonds are Forever’
Aditi Mehrotra (India) Story title: ‘Don’t Ask! Poocho mat!’ 
Martin Bradley (Malaysia; originally UK) Story title: ‘Bougainvillea’ 
Avery Udagawa (Thailand; originally US) Story title: ‘Festival Time.’ Translation of Japanese writer Mogami Ippei. 
Vanessa Ng (Singapore) Story title: ‘The Grey Thread’ 
William Tham (Malaysia) Story title: ‘At the Moonlit River’s Edge’ 
Rebecca Otawa (Japan; originally from Australia) Story title ‘The Rescuer’ 
Ananya Mahapatra (India) Story title: ‘The Bureaucrat’s Wife’ 
Zarin Virji (India) Story title: ‘Lola’s Honeymoon’ 
Anjana Balakrishnan (India) Story title: ‘For Chikki’s Sake’ 
Reba Khatun (British Bangladeshi) Story title: ‘The Attack’ 
Geralyn Pinto (India) Story title: ‘Cakes’ 
Greg Tan (Singapore) Story title ‘Mango and Sticky Rice’ 
Vrinda Baliga (India) Story title: ‘The Cosmic Dance’ 
Malini Gupta (India) Story title: ‘The Cycle’ 
Vineetha Mokkil (India) Story title ‘The Amulet’  
Migs Bravo Dutt (Singapore; originally Philippines) Story title: ‘Begin Again’ 
Anjaly Thomas Story title: ‘Lucas’s Story’ 
Somrita Urni Ganguly (India) Story title: ‘Boba’ Translation of Bengali Writer Banaphool blessed.
Hezreen Abdul Rashid (Malaysia) Story title: ‘Letting Go’ 

About the Editors

Debotri Dhar was educated in India, the United Kingdom and the United States. She holds a Master’s degree in Women’s Studies, with distinction, from the University of Oxford, UK, and a Ph.D. in Women’s and Gender Studies from Rutgers University, USA, and is currently a visiting fellow and lecturer at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA. Debotri juggles university teaching and academic research in the day with lively bursts of creative writing at night. Her short stories have appeared in literary magazines across the world, followed by the short story collection Postcards from Oxford: Stories of Women and Travel. The Courtesans of Karim Street is her second novel.

Zafar Anjum is a Singapore-based journalist, writer and entrepreneur. For eight years, he was the online editor of Computerworld Singapore, Computerworld Malaysia, CIO Asia and MIS Asia. He is the author of six fiction and non-fiction titles, including the best-selling The Resurgence of Satyam (Random House India, 2012), Iqbal: The Life of a Poet, Philosopher and Politician (Random House India, 2014) and Startup Capitals: Discovering the Global Hotspots of Innovation (Random House India, 2014). He is the director of Kitaab.org.


The Best Asian Short Stories 2018

Stories from the inaugural edition of The Best Asian Travel Writing offer you glimpses into the curious, strange and wonderful experiences  in Asia through the eyes and words of our writers. They travelled to find the roots in Cherrapunji, discover the wonders of Bamiyan, volunteer in the high Himalaya, looking for Malgudi among others that offer a frisson of excitement and expectation. 

Currently the Professor & Chairperson, School of Media & Communication MAHE, Dubai, Dr. Percy Fernandez has straddled the world of academics, print, TV, online media and has produced documentaries and TV shows for media organizations like Channel 4, the BBC, Fox TV. He was the expedition photographer for the 2013 NCC Everest Expedition. 

The Best Asian Travel Writing 2020