The Story of An Accidental Author

We were fretting if anyone would come to Joan Hon’s talk.
After all, we know how Malaysians love to read (yes, that is said with a sarcastic grin).
And the true test is that, the talk was going to be held on a Tuesday afternoon in downtown Penang. It was a double-whammy all right – first, no one attends a week day event and of course, no one reads so who would be interested in Joan’s talk right? That’s what everyone tells us.
Wrong. Oh. So. So wrong! (Damn, I love proving naysayers wrong.)
You see, if you want it bad enough, and in our case, if you do your prep early enough and get enough media publicity and promote it like crazy (Josephine and I emailed almost everyone we knew and literally told them this was a once-in-a-lifetime event and “you’d be crazy to miss it”), things do happen.
Lyndy, a friend who works with The Little Penang Street Market, wanted to help us promote it at the market too but unfortunately the timing was not right (the market is held on the last Sunday of each month). But I am grateful so many friends helped us forward the email out and came forward with suggestions to help!
Yesterday we had a blast of a turnout for Joan’s talk. I bet even she was surprised!

We had anticipated only 25 people since the venue wasn’t very spacious. But so many people turned up – so much so that some had standing room only. It was a special event supported by WomenBizSENSE, my businesswomen’s network.

Joan’s talk was made possible because Josephine believed in a dream – a dream of helping her fave author come to Penang and promote her book “Star Sapphire” and “Relatively Speaking”. Josephine had read “Star Sapphire” as a 14-year-old school girl and never forgotten how it made her feel.

Now interestingly the talk attracted a number of attendees in their 50s and beyond. It even attracted 3 visually-impaired attendees who came from St Nicholas Home for the Blind. One Mr Liew flew in from KL that morning just to meet with his longtime teacher too. It was so heartwarming! And even a famous Hong Kong celebrity attended. Two astute attendees recognised her (later I saw them taking photos with her).

Many who attended were there to learn about the ins and outs of writing. Some were writers who had published their own books! It is heartening to know of so many aspiring writers in Penang.
In a way we were all learning about Joan’s learning curve as she referred to herself many times as the ‘accidental author’.
With self-depreciating humour, Joan recounted how she became Han May (the pseudonym she used for “Star Sapphire”). From Joan’s words, I felt that she enjoyed being Han May the most. Joan uses her real name Joan Fong when she writes Singaporean curriculum books (she was a physics teacher) and Joan Hon when she writes non-fiction books such as “Relatively Speaking”, a book about her father’s growing up years and his Finance Minister years in Singapore.

Her first draft was 100 pages long, typed out on her typewriter. She then gave the draft to her daughter to read and she also did research by reading other famous authors like Joseph Conrad (though she admitted she didn’t really like his style). Later, her entire draft turned out to be 700 pages long!
Luck and being with the right people at the right time possibly helped Joan’s work – she knew the right people who not only helped her get the draft done well but also when the book was published, helped with publicity and promotion. Having a good editor was a bonus too.
Joan looked pleased when she told how her daughter’s NUS English professor liked her book “Star Sapphire”. After all this English professor was known to be terribly critical of written work. To have this English professor enjoy her book was an incredible compliment indeed!
Of course she recounted these like mini stories and one elderly gentleman decided to leave because it wasn’t what he had turned up to hear. It was not like she didn’t give her tips on publishing and writing. It was not listed out -one had to listen to her stories to hear the pearls of wisdom in them!
If you are keen to buy Joan’s books in Penang, you can get them at Precious Ones Collections. “Star Sapphire” sells for RM30 while “Relatively Speaking” sells for RM60.

As for me, I met some friendly bloggers too namely Alice Teh and the jovial husband and wife duo,Gill and Jason. All this because Josephine took the time to attend Blogfest (which happened the weekend I was in Kerala, India) and got to know these nice people!
Alice has written a lovely post with even lovelier snapshots of the talk yesterday. Go on over to view them!

P/S: One final thank you to Mr Khoo Kay Soon who gave me his book “Madam White Snake” to read!