To bloggers, by bloggers

There’s a lot of writers in this world, and in many parts of Asia as well. Many produce good books that are like the black holes of the universe – once you get in, you can’t get out until you’ve finish reading it (which is usually the part where we readers sigh once again, because a good book has stopped its tale.)

From a survey that was conducted (either recently or a few years ago, I can’t really remember), the amount of books an average Malaysian reads is 2 per YEAR. Yes TEAR, not MONTHS nor WEEKS. A very shocking figure! Here are some more startling book statistics which might raise eyebrows. More people in the old times read books compared to the now modern era of our time. Some people blame it on the television, and later on, some on the Internet, which you must admit it is partially true for most of the teenagers nowadays. Personally I find books a good source of information and knowledge, I improved my English by reading fiction and nonfiction alike.

For all those bookworms out there, I have great news to share with you all! A writer from Singapore will be coming HERE to Penang to share her experience on writing and being a writer!

Who is the writer?

Joan Hon of course! She is a 67 year old Singaporean who has ties with Penang and has written both fiction and non-fiction, with her most popular fiction being “Star Sapphire”, a sci-fi novel about a headstrong girl called Yva Yolan on her adventures in space. Her science-fiction romance Star Sapphire won a High Commendation Award from the Book Development Council of Singapore in 1986, the same year when she was also awarded a Commendation prize for her better-known book Relatively Speaking on her family and childhood memories.

Pictures of the books:

Star Sapphire (under the pseudonym, Han May)

Relatively Speaking (Joan Hon)

What will the event offer me?
Joan will be sharing with us her experience on writing and being a writer. She will also share snippets of her writer’s life and how a physics teacher like her ended up being a sci-fi writer!

Below are some areas that she will be talking about:

• I would tell my “accidental author” story how I came to be writing books.
• Account of how each of my books came to be written.
• How I seem to have three identities: Joan Hon writes non-fiction, Joan Fong writes Physics, Han May writes fiction.
• Giving talks to sell my books in schools and libraries, book signings in bookshops.
• My attempts at printing my own books. Setting up Hope Publishers.
• Difficulties of publicizing and the options nowadays. POD publishing.

This sounds interesting. Where will be the event be held?
Precious Ones Collections
Title: A Writer’s Journey by Joan Hon
Date: 12 October (Tues)
Time: 2.30pm
Venue: 1st Floor, 56, Lorong Selamat, Penang
[Open to public, men and women alike]
Map to the venue – Click me!

PS: Due to limited space, please reserve a seat for yourself if you are interested in attending and meeting the writer herself in person. Email (info@womenbizsense.com) to reserve a seat at this talk.

A bit more on Joan Hon

A 1986 article by The Straits Times on Joan Hon’s two books that won her two awards.

A more recent interview that was conducted by The Star: Read all about it here!

Joan Hon is the daughter of the former Finance Minister of S’pore (her father, the late Hon Sui Sen, was actually from Balik Pulau). She wrote a book “Relatively Speaking” chronicling her father’s growing up years in Balik Pulau and later his position as the Finance Minister of Singapore. Among the anecdotes were about her father’s attempt to learn Mandarin together with Lee Kuan Yew, and how they shared tapes and monitored each other’s progress!

Her late father was often regarded as one of Southeast Asia’s most successful economic planners besides being one with the most integrity! A British official, upon meeting Joan’s mother, says, “Pleased to meet you. I hear your husband is the most honest man in the [Singapore] civil service”. This remark, says Joan, was to her the highest accolade and the most meaningful among all her father’s achievements.

BONUS!
For those interested in getting her books that are autographed by her, you’re in luck! There’s a 10% discount for all books that are autographed by her!
Source: YourPenang

Various bits of information were taken from MayaKirana and AliceTeh I hope you guys/girls don’t mind!

A few snippets from the e-mail Jo Lau send me (Thank you!):
She feels that the Penang public can benefit from this book talk as she will be touching on topics such as “Print-on-demand”. The whole idea is to write a book first, collect the money second, THEN print and lastly deliver the book(s) to your customers. There is no storage cost or book shelf rental for display and that is fantastic!

Jo Lau has also invited members from St. Nicholas Home for the Blind and they have expressed interest because writing a book could help them become financially independent! It would be great for them!

All the pictures in this post was provided by Jo Lau, thank you very much!

I highly recommend enthusiastic readers and writers to come and join us during this event because it’s a VERY rare chance to have indeed for us all. It is pretty rare for writers to come to Penang after all!