A Probability of Being

So I guess this is the time of year that we tally up what we have published over the year. And, despite how rotten the year has been going, I think this is my personal best in terms of what I managed to get published! Now if only that translated into academic publishing, too.  Poetry: " Sweetness and Light " was published in the inaugral issue of recompose magazine ! It is a poem about a young woman who literally spews forth sweetness and light when she speaks, and her sense of degradation when other people feel entitled to her. It is 50 lines, so eligible for Best Long Poem Rhysling.  Short fiction: " Anak Sungai " was published in Truancy, a little story about a river meeting various forest animals as she goes out to sea. There is one animal she wants to find but he is a tricky one.  " Crocodile Tears " was published in Lightspeed Magazine, a retelling of two Malaysian folktales: one of Si Tenggang, the faithless son, and the other tal...

I'm going to be at LosCon43: Starship LosCon! Click for my schedule of panels, and come out to see me! I'll also be tabling for the Eaton Special Collection of UC Riverside. We'll be showing off some of our items, and telling you all about the cool science fiction research that you could be doing with us!

My latest publication is Hidden Youth: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History ! And the book is officially out November 21, 2016! My story "A Name to Ashes" will be the second story you'll read in the book, and it has this marvelous illustration by Alice Meichi Li ! Alice is a Chinese-American artist based in New York City, and we talked a little about representation over Twitter. I love the illustration so much! Here is the black-and-white version you'll see in the book: © Alice Meichi Li! My story is about a young clerk who accompanies the historical Chen Lanpin on what would be known as the Chinese Commission to Cuba of 1874. Excerpts from the results of this report have been translated. I first learned about it when taking a class on race and racism in the United States, in which the professor gave us a transnational view of how slavery and indentured servitude created rifts and alliances between various groups. Our textbook for this segmen...

Interfictions Online , a journal of interstitial arts, has released their latest issue! This issue includes an interview with Tade Thompson by Sofia Samatar, poetry by Neile Graham and Jeanne Hall Gailey , as well as a new short story by Nino Cipri !  I'm so pleased that my story, " Mana Langkah Pelangi Terakhir? (Where is the Rainbow's Last Step?) " is in such great company! "Langkah Pelangi" is inspired by a dream I had in which I found a friend in a jail far away from home, and the last I saw of her was in a sampan punting off to sea. I get home to discover that she has died, and been mythologized. And I thought, wouldn't that be kinda crazypants to live in a work where the collective imagination could have so much power, that a dead person could become a myth that never dies ? What if that was literal? I had a lot of trouble with this story. It bounced off a couple of places, and each time I revised it, and then revised it some more upo...

I don't usually announce when I've signed a contract, and tend to announce future publication news only when I have a Table of Contents to share, but it's coming into the last quarter of 2016, and I'm putting together my CV and had to count up my forthcoming publications. The other day I thought I had three. But no, upon further reflection, I actually have four.  "Mana Langkah Pelangi Terakhir," translated one way into "Where Is The Rainbow's Last Step," will be out in the Fall issue of Interfictions Online . It is about what might happen in our world where, if enough people dream the same thing and relate the same stories enough times with enough conviction, even if it isn't true or possible, it will come true. Our heroine is a journalist trying to make sense of this in light of a colleague's re-appearance. I tend to forget about this one because it's already fall so I kind of think it's already out, except it's not, just...

My short story "Crocodile Tears" is now live at the Lightspeed Magazine website !!! In addition, I got a little author spotlight as well ! Thanks to my editor Wendy Wagner, and to EIC John Joseph Adams for publishing this!!

It's my birthday week--I have resolved to start on the day before (especially here in North America, because I was born in Malaysia, so my birthday is always 12 hours behind here!) and celebrate it all the way to the end of the week. This started sometime in my late 20s, because the surprise that I am still alive past the age of 21 somehow doesn't lift. I'm always a little outside my body at this time of year: how did I make it this far? In my teens I was convinced I would be dead by now, because at that age I simply couldn't see past 21.  Yet here I am. Part of a small family of writers and readers, with friends who are delightful and creative and kind and sweet. Among this family's ranks is S. Qiouyi Lu, who I met on the Tumblr, and who has since blossomed into a wonderful poet! Their poem " Meat Bone Tea ," based on the legendary bak kut teh soup I've made for the both of us on the occasion of their being back in California, was recently publish...

The latest issue of Lightspeed Magazine, containing my short story "Crocodile Tears" is now live! If you have a subscription you'll be able to read it immediately, of course. If not, you can subscribe to this fine magazine or buy it as an individual ebook ! There is also a schedule for when it's released on the main website --"Crocodile Tears" is out on the 20th of September and I shall be sure to post a direct link to it as soon as I can! In the mean time, you can enjoy other marvelous stories in the issue ^_^

" I was chosen for the Constitutional Convention! " is generally how I feel about being able to say that I will be editing The WisCon Chronicles, Vol. 11 !! The theme will be " Trials by Whiteness. "  WisCon40 followed a seismic shift in the demographics of the convention. Following the success of the POC Safer Space, there is now a Genderqueer / Trans Lounge, and a Disability Lounge. Programming actively seeks a diversity of panelists. How have these changes come about, and what have their ramifications been? The theme, "Trials by Whiteness" examines how what bell hooks calls the white-supremacist capitalist (cishetero)patriarchy has affected the feminism of WisCon and created difficult confrontations and conversations on the clashing perceptions of attendees. "Whiteness" refers to the position from which white supremacy operates. It has constantly moving goalposts by which everyone is measured. Whiteness does not refer only to white...

I'm pleased to announce that I'm in the September 2016 issue of Lightspeed Magazine ! I sold the story last year but generally refrain from announcing anything official until I see a table of contents. And wow! I'm sharing a TOC with An Owomoyela and Nisi Shawl! Also Maria Dhavana Headley, who I had the chance to participate in a class Skype session with while I was at Clarion!  My story, "Crocodile Tears," will be familiar to attendees of the reading I did with Nisi Shawl and Sam J. Miller this past ICFA. It's a combination of two of my favourite Malay folktales, the story of Si Tenggang, and the story of the old woman and the crocodiles. This will be the second story this year with crocodiles who are not mean and nasty (the first being " Anak Sungai " at Truancy). I hope you enjoy "Crocodile Tears"!

Neil Clarke, publisher of Clarkesworld , is editor of the Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume One from Night Shade Books this year. He selected a range to be published in the anthology, and since it apparently doesn't encompass everything he wanted, he also has a recommended reading list for best science fiction of 2015. " Liminal Grid " is on that list!

And I'm in it! Lim Jia was raised by the local monks, and has the ability to see the spirits of the departed. Jia joins the Chinese Commission to Cuba as a clerk to search for a long-lost brother, and finds many others long lost in the process.

I'm pleased to announce that I'm in recompose magazine #1: tropospheric scofflaw ! And very very honoured that my poem, " Sweetness and Light ," opens the magazine to a set of very interesting flash fiction! "Sweetness and Light" began with an idea of the very first two lines: "when she speaks, sweetness and light spill forth / literally." What would that be like, to live like that? Combined with rape culture and the entitlement of society towards young women's bodies and time, I decided to explore what would happen if boundaries were crossed too often for a person who lived with this phenomenon. Enjoy! 

I will be attending WisCon40! Here is my schedule for the weekend: YES, Our Stories Matter: Encouragement and Support For Creators With Marginalized Identities Friday, 4pm - 5.15pm, University C Jaymee Goh (M), Riley, Alex Jennings, Mark Oshiro, Susan Simensky Bietila  Marginalization affects our success as creators, oppression impacts our ability to create and can grind us down. At the same time, encouragement can come in many ways, from reader comments to supporting each other as marginalized creators. Let's discuss issues like: Why do you keep creating? When do you know you've touched someone with your art? How do you recharge after a setback? How can we support each other within and between different marginalized groups? When it feels like the whole world is telling you that your story doesn't matter, where do you find the strength to pick up the pen? The Downsides to Maker Culture Sat, 9:00–10:15 pm, Conference 1 Georgie L. Schnobrich (M), Candra K...

In loving memory of Goh Mei Mei, passed 4/4/16

Unlike many other people, I didn't apply several times. I apply only for specific line-ups. 2012 was, as I recall, a "year of Asians" with Hiromi Goto teaching at Clarion West, and Ted Chiang and Marjorie Liu teaching at Clarion. Before that, Kelly Link and Gavin Grant were teaching Clarion West, and I highly respect Small Beer Press and wanted to learn from them about the founding process. In general, I've been quite confident in my own skill and learning ability in writing fiction that I can sell. Clarion and Clarion West are highly competitive, and to be sure, there are very many deserving writers who don't get in. Every rejection I received, I would get bummed, and someone would gently remind me, there are other ways of succeeding in the writing world, among them the slow and steady track I've been working on for myself.  This year, I decided to try for Clarion because the instructor line-up (Kelly Link, Ted Chiang, Andy Duncan, Victor LaValle, Del...

It's  Bill Campbell 's birthday! I am now going to tell you a story about him: I first heard of him through the MOTHERSHIP call for submissions, and I was like "well, cool, but I got nothin' for an Afrofuturist anthology." Was totally going to buy it, though. Then suddenly Bill's in my inbox all, "hey, you wanna send us something?" And I'm like "whut, me??" because at the time, I had nothing, just a ranty blog and one steampunk story, and there wasn't much of a market for steampunk stories set in rather obscure countries back then, but Bill says, "yeah, you" so I send it to him anyway. Next thing I know I'm in a book with people I have crazy respect for like  Nisi Shawl  and  Sofia Samatar  and  Nora Jemisin  and  Silvia Moreno-Garcia . I'm sharing space with people I didn't know like  Minister Faust  and  Ernest Hogan  and  Daniel José Older  and  Chinelo Onwualu  who I hadn't met yet, hadn't ...

As one of the Author Spotlights for AnomalyCon 2016, con chair Kronda Seibert invited me to participate in the AnomalyCards, a set of postcards distributed at random, to be traded with other attendees for the whole set. Writers would contribute a flash fic, and artists would illustrate them. This sounded like a fine idea, so of course I sent in a thing! Here is the result!

I was recently invited to partake in a roundtable of sorts for International Women's Day at ELLE Malaysia, and was asked the question, "what is the greatest problem facing Malaysian women today?"  What a giant question! With no easy answer, and one either is going for incomplete, or totally pithy. I decided to go high abstract instead . It feels strange to read the other responses; my answer is so incredibly academic in comparison. Times like this, I worry that maybe I'm too academic. But it was an interesting challenge all the same!

A short short story I wrote, " Anak Sungai ," is now available to read at Truancy #2 . Truancy is a venue for fairytale re-tellings, re-castings, re-creations. I share a table of contents with the incredible Vajra Chandrasekera , fellow Malaysians Eeleen Lee and Sukhbir Cheema, and the lovely Mari Ness and Sarah Yasin! "Anak Sungai" is what my friend Munira calls "cerita rakyat moden." "Cerita rakyat" more properly translates to "folktale"; a direct translation is something like "tales of the citizenry," ha! It's the story of a river going out to sea. The animal names are in Malay, because I wrote this first and foremost for the audience that reads Malay and English at once!

I'm pleased to say that I am an invited author to the 37th International Conference of the Fantastic in the Arts this year! I will be reading at 10.30am on Thursday, in Author Readings IV, Vista A! The chair will be Rachel Swirsky, and my co-readers are the inestimable Nisi Shawl and Sam J. Miller !! I think our outfit theme will be green.  Not only that, but my co-editor Joyce Chng will also be attending! It's her first North American appearance so I'm very excited to see her on this side of the Pacific for once. Please come! 

So now that " Liminal Grid " has been up for a few months now, I guess I should talk about some of the things I wrote into the story that are very personal to me!

This is a bit late (been busy) but the results of the Strange Horizons 2015 Readers Poll came out, and " Liminal Grid " is #3 in the fiction category!!! I'm stoked to be on the same list as my friend Gabby Reed, a tremendous writer. Also on the poll lists are incredible poems by Rose Lemberg and Shweta Narayan, and Rose's incredible article on using folklore in fiction ! Congrats to all the winners, and thanks for voting, readers!