Singapore Noir

April 7, 2014
Singapore, with its great wealth and great poverty existing amid ethnic, linguistic, and cultural tensions, offers fertile ground for bleak fiction, as shown by the 14 tales in this solid Akashic noir anthology. One standout is S.J. Rozan’s “Kena Sai,” in which an ex-pat bends over backward to accommodate his ambitious wife, until she goes too far. Other notable selections include Philip Jeyaretnam’s “Strangler Fig,” in which a government minister discovers that some people are like the eponymous plant, which can gradually suffocate you; Colin Cheong’s “Smile, Singapore,” about an elderly taxi driver whose life is unexpectedly transformed when he finds a gun left in his cab; and Damon Chua’s “Saiful and the Pink Edward VII,” in which the title character will do anything to reclaim a rare stamp—a family heirloom—from cruel Madame Zhang. Tan has assembled a strong lineup of Singapore natives and knowledgeable visitors for this volume exploring the dark side of a fascinating country.