Centuries way of life is on the way out

It is estimated that there are approximately 100 tribes still living as hunter gathers, mainly in Brazil, Peru, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia.

But these stone-age people are in grave danger of being forced off their land by multi-national timber logging companies that plunder and destroy the precious environmental habitat and centuries old way of life.

In The White Amah by Ann Massey an impoverished Dayak tribe has no chance against a Chinese timber baron. And neither, I fear, does the lost tribe recently discovered in the Amazonian jungles of Brazil.

Nothing's so much fun as simply messing about in boats but ...

In a few hours, my son, Duncan and his partner, Jaine will be arriving home after taking delivery of a yacht and sailing it from Surfer's Paradise to Fremantle with minimal knowledge of seafaring and things nautical. From the sound of it the journey was uneventful, which is a bad thing in a way, because we learn more from a damn good scare than from parental warnings. But, I have to admit that I'm no shining example.

It's been some time since some friends and I set sail from Labuan, a small island off the coast of Borneo for a few hours fishing in the South China Sea. It was a perfect day. The sky was cloudless, the azure sea was smooth and sparkling and there's nothing, absolutely nothing better than flying through the foam with a wave creaming the ledge of the boat.

We dropped the sea anchor about thirty kilometres west of the island and that's when we remembered that we'd forgotten to bring any bait. It looked like we'd have to forget about fishing but then we spotted another vessel. My partner took off his shirt and waved it madly and the smack changed directions.

Soon the ramshackle, leaky old craft was bobbing up and down alongside. None of us could speak Bahasa and so we used gestures and mime to explain that we wanted to buy a fish. The twenty ringgit identified us as wealthy tourists, ripe for the taking, and within minutes the single solitary fishing boat had swelled to a mini armada.

A month before a group of pirates had killed a fisherman and taken his boat but we knew nothing of that. The authorities had a policy of suppressing information about the explosion of piracy and we had no idea that we were courting danger.

Unlike the the four American tourists on a world tour who were hijacked and killed by pirates in the Indian Sea in February, we came out of the incident poorer but unscathed. However, I now realize that we were lucky not to have been taken hostage. The large sums paid out in ransom money is encouraging more and more poor Filipino and Indonesians to exchange their fishing nets for AK-47's, RPG's and semi-automatic pistols with the result that two ships a week are being hijacked.

So while there's nothing absolutely nothing better than messing about in boats ... perhaps, it's wiser to stay at home!

You can read about tourists who weren't as lucky as me in my latest thriller, The White Amah.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Shopping can be perilous: shopaholics in need of a fix put their lives in danger

A former ex-pat reminisces about life in Borneo

When I first went to live in Miri on the Island of Borneo, there were none of the modern shopping centers or department stores that I was used to back home in Australia. There were plenty of strange little shops selling everything from plastic Buddhas to 100 year old eggs to tiger balm and, at first, I’d been as intrigued as any Western tourist but after two years I’d started to dream of endless supermarkets, extensive malls, trendy boutiques and major departmental stores.

Kuala Belait (KB), the second largest city in Brunei was only 120kms away and I went there regularly to buy Diet Coke which you couldn’t get in Miri but mainly to renew my tourist visa. You see my visa was only good for a month but that was never a problem because we lived close to the border between Malaysia and Brunei. Every time I returned from my regular monthly shopping expedition in KB, the Malaysian immigration officers would extend my visa for another 4 weeks hence the attraction. But while the supermarket stocked more Western food lines, what was on offer in the local shops, in the way of fashion, make-up and accessories, was on par with Miri.

Members of my bridge group talked about Yohannes, a world class store in Bandar Seri Begawin (BSB), the capital of Brunei and home to the Sultan, then the richest man in the world. Yohannes sold everything you’d expect to find in a world-class store like Harrods or Macey’s. I was in dire need of a shopping fix and my friend, Clare felt the same. When she suggested we take a trip to BSB, I jumped at the chance.

BSB was another 120 kms further than KB - too far for a day trip. But, with both our partners working on a rig in the South China Sea for another fortnight, we were fancy free. As excited as schoolgirls, we set off for Brunei.

It took a lot longer than we’d thought to travel 240kms. There was always a long wait for the ferry ride across the Belait, the river that divides Brunei and Malaysia and rather, than waiting in turn, many of the locals just pushed in.

That day it was worse than usual and when we eventually reached the immigration station on the Malaysian side of the border, it was closed. Generally immigration stations close for two hours between 12 and 2. As a result, we didn’t get to BSB until after five.

Not to be deterred from our mission, we booked into the hotel, dumped our bags, asked for directions and set out on our quest. The concierge told us that the quickest route was through Kampong Ayer (the Water Village).

About 39,000 people live in ramshackle wooden shanties built on stilts in the river. It's a well-known tourist attraction but as I looked around, I noticed we were were the only foreigners.

As we walked along a complex web of waterways, the sun was setting and I felt a twinge of uneasiness. It might look quaint and picturesque by daylight, but something told me this was not the pace for two blonds to be walking unattended in the dark. Clare felt the same and we both, agreed to come back in a taxi.

By now, it was dark and the neighborhood was deserted. In the distance, we could see the bright red letters of Yohannes’ neon sign. Leaving the Kampong we walked toward the beacon, feeling discouraged because it still seemed miles away.

Just ahead we could dimly see a field. It may have been a soccer pitch or some kind of playing field, but it was too dark to see if there were goal posts. ‘What do we do now?’ asked Clare, looking dubiously at the wide drainage ditch between the road and the field.

It was obviously going to add another 30 minutes to our journey if we walked around the perimeter of the field and I replied, ‘We jump.’

Now Clare and I made an odd couple. For a start Clare, 15 years younger, is tall, fit and athletic while I’m short and haven’t exercised since I left school in 1960. Wouldn't you think, if anyone was going to fall in the brink, it would have been me? But I cleared the filthy ditch with inches to spare. Clare wasn’t so lucky.

I helped her out but her legs were caked with foul-smelling mud. Ploughing on in silence, you can't blame Clare for not seeing the funny side, we cut across the field and ten minutes later, rolled up at the entrance of a very impressive building. The washroom was near the entry and very posh … no wonder - the Sultan’s wives and daughters shopped at Yohannes.

Clare had her leg in the wash basin and was attempting to scrape off the excrement when in walked three princesses in luxurious, silk robes like something out of an Arabian Night’s dream. Sooo embarrassing!!

Luckily, there was a telephone box handy. I phoned every taxi company in the directory. All the numbers rang out. A passerby, when questioned, told us taxis in BSB only operated until 4pm, no kidding!

Despite the mishap (my word choice, not Clare's), we'd been luckier than we deserved. Walking back would really have been pushing the envelope. I phoned the hotel, explained the situation and within half an hour we were back in our room. The last thing Clare said to me before turning out the light was that she’d never go anywhere with me again.

Next day we drove back to Miri. All that we’d seen of Yohannes was the washroom. It was all we were ever to see – we never went back.

Miri is the setting for The White Amah a mystery/ thriller set against the backdrop of the timber industry in Malaysia. If you'd like to read an extract or purchase the book, click here.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Conmen and cheats: men who prey on vulnerable women

A former ex-pat reflects on her life in Miri.

It was to be expected that we would socialize with Bryn (not his real name). When you're living in a foreign country you gravitate to your own countrymen and there weren’t a lot of Australian’s living in Miri. Like 90% of the men working in the oil town, Bryn worked for Shell but he was an entrepreneur from way back and it wasn’t long before he opened his own bar.

In the 90’s you couldn’t open a business in Miri without taking on a Bumiputra partner. Bumiputra is the Malaysian term for the indigenous people of Malaysia, the Dayaks. It means son of the land but it was a daughter of the land that Bryn took on as his Bumiputra partner.

Already a victim, Rosie had been deserted by her husband and she was struggling to bring up six children without any financial assistance from her ex or the government. In Dayak culture the family bond is strong and when Bryn offered Rosie a job, as his live-in amah, her sister offered to look after the children.

Although Bryn had a wife and family back in Australia, it wasn’t long before he and Rosie were in a relationship. Imagine how she felt when Bryn told her about his plans to open a bar and offered her a partnership. For a poor uneducated woman with no prospects but a life of drudgery, it must have been like winning first prize in a lottery.

Once a cheat always a cheat and it wasn’t long before Bryn was cheating on Rosie. When she went back to her longhouse for Gawai (the Dayak harvest festival), Bryn took off for the duty free island of Labuan with Flora, a pretty young barmaid. The last thing Rosie did, before she set off in happy ignorance for a re-union with her children was to take in the large box addressed to Bryn that she found on the veranda.
A week later when Bryn returned the whole house ponged, blood had seeped from the box, dripped from the table and pooled on the floor. Someone had sent Bryn the severed head of a pig minus one ear. When he was a teenager Bryn had come off a motorbike and he’d lost his outer ear. You didn’t need to be Einstein to figure out who the pig represented!

That evening my partner and I went to Bryn’s for a few drinks and he told us about finding the pig’s head and showed us the blood-stained note he’d discovered at the bottom of the box. It warned him that if he continued playing around with Muslim women there’d be another head in a box and it also would only have one ear.

Unlike the guy in 'The godfather' who woke up with a horse's head in bed beside him, Bryn seemed unfazed. Anyone, with any sense, would have got out of town. I mean this was the wild, wild East and I’d heard stories of ex-pats who had accidentally run down a child being hacked to death by the relatives.

I don’t know what else Bryn did to get on the wrong side of the locals but on two occasions gangsters broke into the premises and broke up the place. Maybe he had refused to pay protection money. Any way word got round. Work colleagues, frightened for their safety stopped patronizing the bar. Bills mounted up and Bryn did a runner leaving poor old Rosie with all the debts.

Last thing I heard Bryn had talked himself into a $300,000 job in Nigeria.

If you'd like to hear more about ex-pats and amahs you might enjoy my book: The White Amah. It's available on amazon and you can read an excerpt and reviews on my site: http://annmasseyauthor.net

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

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The strange and amazing people you meet on public transport.

Lots of children have never used public transport and a ride on a bus or a train for many preschoolers is exciting and more newsworthy than a flight on Virgin or QANTAS. It’s worth mentioning here that I was fourteen when I went up in a plane for the first time. We were about to emigrate to Australia and my father paid out a pound, in the old currency, for a five minute trip over Morecombe Bay.

I don’t know what type of plane but it looked like a Tiger Moth. It was certainly of that vintage. In 1959 air travel was beyond the means of working class families but entrepreneurs (possibly ex- wartime pilots that had survived the Battle of Britain), had snapped up RAF planes. The short trips they offered were a thrilling alternative to donkey rides on the sands at Blackpool, Southport and Morecombe.

The extravagant treat was unlooked for. Horse mad I would have preferred a ride on one of the donkeys. But I wasn’t consulted. Assisted migrants (ten pound poms), we were bound for a brave new and, what, I now think my father thought, was a backward world. I have never forgotten him telling us to make the most of the opportunity. We’d never get the chance to go up in a plane again. My father died three years before the birth of his great-granddaughter, Molly. He’d be amazed by the blasé attitude to air travel of a 4 year old frequent flyer.

But I digress - when I accompanied my partner, Cole to Miri, for the first time for years, I found myself without a car and with hours and hours of time on my hands. Before he went to work the first day, he warned me never, ever to go into Miri on my own. I think he felt confident that I had no alternative than to stay put because, like many non-users of public transport, it never entered his head that I would hop on a bus.

In the five years that I spent in Miri, I never saw another ex-pat on the bus with the result that I became somewhat of a local celebrity. I never had to stand, someone was always ready to give up their seat to me and strangers would regularly offer to pay my fare.

One incident that stands out in my memory was a conversation with a fellow passenger. The tribal Dayak told me about life in his longhouse, stories about a world that is disappearing as fast as the jungle that once covered the entire island of Borneo. Just before his stop, he asked me if I would like to see an image of his tribe’s old king and he took the medallion he was wearing from around his neck.

It was with great reverence, he handed me the ornament. Immediately, I recognized Edward V11’s head on the drilled half-crown, (two shillings and sixpence in the old currency). When I was a child it was still common to receive old coins, particularly pennies with the heads of former monarchs. Edward the V11 coins were rare but not as rare as his mother Queen Victoria. I was surprised I’d expected the King to be a Malaysian sultan or one of the White Rajahs, the Brookes, an English dynasty that founded and ruled the Kingdom of Sarawak from 1841 to 1946.

When I handed back the medallion, I told him that Edward had also been my king too and the former head-hunter swelled with pride to learn that the king of Sarawak had once ruled over England. How did I know my new friend had taken a head? Well he didn’t tell me, he didn’t need to. His fingers were covered with tattoos known as tegulan. Each tattoo corresponded with the taking of a human head.

Many of the customs I wrote about in The White Amah I heard from fellow commuters. You meet the most interesting people on public transport.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

And the Winner is ...

An ex-pat who lived for 5 years in Miri recalls her adventures and misadventures. In today’s episode, she concludes a recount of life with Jelimah, a teenage Iban amah.

I’m not a big believer in fate. I lean toward: ‘I am the captain of my ship and the master of my destiny’ philosophy but sometimes, it seems like fate is determined to wreck your dreams. Take the day of the beauty pageant - everything that could go wrong went wrong, starting with a burst water pipe in the upstairs bathroom.

I had intended driving Jelimah to the beauty parlour – she was having the works, hair, make-up and nails. Later the plan was to collect her after she’d morphed into a beauty queen but I had a flood on my hands, soon to be followed by another, because Jelimah turned on the waterworks too.

Sending Jelimah still weeping off in a cab, I spent a frustrating hour trying to find a plumber who understood English. By now water, was dripping through the ceiling into the living room below. Fortunately, the floor was tiled. Alas, that wasn’t the case upstairs. The bathroom was fitted with a thick Wilton carpet, mulberry, and the exact shade of the commercial-size spa and wall tiles.

It was dusk and I was still mopping up after the plumber and hoping the landlord wouldn’t blame me when Jelimah, exquisite in heavy Asian makeup her long glossy hair piled on top of her head, secured by jewelled clips, returned. She was accompanied by a stranger, a cousin skilled in the art of folding the traditional kebaya, the intricate blouse, dress worn by Dayak women. The girls disappeared into the bedroom. Their tinkling laughter came to an abrupt halt when ten minutes later the power went off.

Power black outs were a part of life in Miri and I was prepared. I found the candles and gave two to Jelimah. Deep channels in her inch thick make-up wouldn’t do and she bravely held back tears that sparkled in her brilliant eyes, I must admit I’d have cried too if I’d have had to get ready a big night in the dark.

I never have been keen on driving at night and Mary-Grace, an ex-pat like me was just as eager to cheer on Jelimah. She picked us up about seven in her car. The power was still off. ‘But that doesn’t mean it will be off in Krokop too,’ I reassured Jelimah, with a confidence I was far from feeling, considering the way our luck was running.

As expected, the building was in darkness. We parted company, Mary- Grace and I to a gloomy, stifling hall, Jelimah to hot and airless cramped upstairs room, where the humidity played havoc with the entrants’ makeup and hair dos. It was 2 hours before the lights came back on.

Surprise! The beauty pageant wasn’t the only entertainment provided. The main event was preceded by a Malaysian song contest. It went on interminably. Possibly I would have enjoyed it more if there’d been a selection of songs; instead I sat through at least twenty presentations of the same song … in Bahasa.

It was midnight before the pageant began. All the girls were utterly gorgeous, none more so than Jelimah. She didn’t win though and yes, there were tears. Jelimah insisted the contest was fixed. Maybe she was right, the winner was no prettier than the other girls but she did have the advantage of being the judge’s niece.

To crown off a catastrophic night - when Mary-Grace and I got back to the car, (Jelimah had gone to a night club with a party of friends and was spared this final calamity), the lights had been left on and the battery was as flat as a pancake.

Two blondes 3.00 am in the wildest part of the wild, wild East and not another ex-pat to be found. We walked back to the hall. Luckily, the manager was still packing up and he generously drove us back to Pujat.

Next morning Jelimah told me she was quitting and she was in a hurry; her friends were waiting in the car. ‘Have you got another job,’ I asked, hovering as she packed? Although I felt slighted, after all I’d treated her more like a daughter than a servant, I didn’t begrudge her bettering herself

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘I’ve got my old job back at the dry cleaners.’

How sharper it is than a serpent’s tooth to have a thankless child!

Multiple Births: a blessing or a blight?

An ex-pat who lived Miri for five years narrates what she learned from her amah about Dayak customs.

Jelimah, my teenage Iban amah was mad keen to enter the Dayak beauty pageant. It was something of a family tradition. Her aunt has come first, years back and Jelimah was keen to follow in the legendary beauty queen's footsteps.

The competition was only open to Dayaks. Dayak is a collective name for the indigenous people of Sarawak. However, it isn't a tribe - like Europeans, Dayaks come from many different tribes, each with its own distinctive culture, customs and language. Iban, Kelabit, Bidayuh, Kenyah and Penan are some of the tribes living in the jungles surrounding Miri.

Jelimah was an Iban the most populous and well known of the tribes. Her long house was situated in the back blocks of Kuching, the state capital. She told me she was one of 24 children. I didn't believe her at first. I mean, I have a friend whose mother gave birth to a baker's dozen and my partner has eight siblings. But 24!! Come on ...

It turned out it was all true. Multiple births ran in the family- several sets of twins and triplets had swelled the juvenile ranks.

Jelimah never said anything to me about multiple births bringing misfortune. Be-Be told me. Be-Be was another Iban amah that I got to know; our partners worked together. She told me that her tribe believed that malevolent spirits were responsible for multiple births and that they brought bad luck.

" It's what we believe. It's not just the family who'll suffer. The whole village will be harmed.Rice won't grow, there won't be any wild pigs to hunt, people will get sick and young women will give birth to dead babies."

A triplet herself, she was lucky to survive. Immediately after Be-Be and her siblings were born, they were abandoned outside a convent.

Compassion was in short supply. Brought up as servants to the nuns, they were beaten for the smallest transgression and often went hungry. They weren't taught to read or write but that wasn't unusual. I doubt that they'd have fared any better in the education department in their village. However they would, I am sure, have been given the most basic of gifts - a name. Instead the nuns referred to them as A, B and C. Isn't that simply awful.

At least the nuns didn't break Be-Be's spirit because she did escape. How the friendless and penniless girl made it to Miri I don't know. But arrive there she did and found work too - in a bakery where she caught the eye of a Canadian Driller.

Taking him up on his job offer - he was on the lookout for an amah, an intimate relationship developed. They have now been together for more than 15 years. Things worked out well for this Iban Cinderella. I hope A and C are happy too! But who knows they may still be confined to a life of thankless servitude in the jungle convent.

Meanwhile preparations were underway for the big event ...

I'll tell you more about the pageant in my next blog.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Borneo's Tropical Rain Forest is disappearing fast: so what?

Trees are vital to human existence because they are the lungs of the earth. Man can survive for months without food but without oxygen life ceases within minutes.

When you destroy a blade of grass

You poison England at her roots

Remember no man's foot can pass

Where evermore no green grass shoots.

I first heard those lines from 'To Iron- Founders and Others' by Gordon Bottomley over fifty years ago when I was a pupil in Mr. Worthington's English Class at Hayward Grammar School.

Over the years I have read articles in newspapers and magazines, listened to lectures and viewed documentaries about the far reaching effects of deforestation but I cannot quote from a single one. Who says poetry isn't relevant in the twenty-first century? Bottomley's warning is indelibly stamped on my conscious and my conscious .

Today I recited this poem to my students and then went on to tell them about what is happening in Borneo. How proud, formerly self-sufficient Dayaks have been forced off their ancestral lands by rapacious loggers and forced to live beggarly lives because they lack the education and skills to adapt to a changed environment. This led to a heated discussion about Develoment vs Conservation: such is the power of poetry.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Click to Save the Rainforest

I saved 7.4 square feet of rain forest today and I'm going to do the same tomorrow. It's easy and it's free. Just click on the Care2 site at http://www.Care2/click-to-donate/rainforest/ for a simple and free way to save the environment. Every 100% free click, generates donations from the foundation's sponsors. You may click once a day or every day. Over 119 million acres of land and 5000miles of river have been protected since the inception of The Nature Conservancy. What a great way to fight back against mulit-national companies that plunder and destroy the precious environmental habitat and centuries old way of tribal life by logging the rainforest.

My interest in protecting the rainforest began when I lived for five years in Sarawak on the island of Borneo and saw for myself the unique beauty of the jungle covered island. But the Borneo rainforest, one the wonders of the naural world, is disappearing at an alarming rate. Almost three quarters of the original forest is already gone and, at the current rate of destruction, almost all of Indonesia's forests will be gone by 2022 - along with the world's largest butterflies, flowers big as refrigerators, pygmy elephants, Sumatran Tigers and the forest orangutans.

I was living in Borneo in 1997 when massive forest fires burned millions of acres, engulfing neighboring countries in polluting smoke. Palm oil growers intentionally set the great majority of these fires to clear land. Having seen a kampong torched by land developers, I used the incident in my novel The White Amah:

"The entire village had been caught up in the preparation for the wedding. The resonant sound of brass gongs and the thud of drums echoed across the pineapple plantations, drowning out the squeal of the fatted pig the excited children were poking with sharpened sticks. When the groom and his family arrived the tormented beast would be butchered outside the longhouse in front of the bride's door.

The bride's mother was putting the finishing touches to the feast when she heard a lorry coming up the jungle track. She frowned. The guests were early and there was still much to do. Laughing happily, the children abandoned their victim and anticipating lollies, raced off to welcome the guests from the groom's longhouse. Without warning armed men erupted from the vehicle, shooting their rifles wildly, trampling the bridal feast spread out on mats in front of each longhouse door and driving the frightened families into the jungle. The mens' orders were to burn down the longhouse, but the gasoline-fed flames spread to the adjacent jungle.

The fire burned for three days and destroyed all the valuable old-growth forest the villagers had refused to sell. Along with the precious timber, thirty three lives were lost, including that of the teenage bride who'd run barefoot into the jungle to escape the men intent on raping every girl they could catch. It was an open secret that the arsonists worked for Joseph Ling."

The White Amah is available from http://www.amazon.com/ Purchasing the book is an easy way to help save the rainforest. 10% of author royalties are being donated to the Borneo Tropical Rainforest Foundation.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Review of The White Amah

It's fab when friends tell you they love your book but a glowing review from someone you've never met that's something else! This is what Wendy O'Hanlon of 'Click, A Cultural Connection' had to say: -

Delving into The White Amah is like eating a rich dessert - layers and layers of delightful surprises. The story begins so innocently in Australia and then follows so many hard-edged surprising turns that the reader's head is spinning - in a most delightful way - through Malaysia and then onto London.

And just like a many -layered dessert, you simply can't dally in savouring the different offerings - all must be impatiently revealed.

The Author, Ann Massey, introduces us to the main characters one by one - like the many layered dessert. At first we are rapt in the dancing, rocking Crystal - an ambitious teenager who secures a dancing contract in Malaysia. Our attention then turns to the impoverished Rubiah who schemes her way out of the drudgery of tribal life in a Dayak village. But then we are immersed in the the battle of little Mei Li - a girl who believes she came from a Dayak village but feels somewhat of an outcast because of her fairer skin and height.

Behind these personal stories is the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia which makes multi-national companies rich while plundering and destroying the precious environmental habitat and centuries old tribal way of life.

Massey has crafted an unforgettable novel full of the curious twists and turns of fate. A very satisfying read and delicious to the very end.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367

Sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds

When I first started to think about a title for my novel one of the ideas I jotted down was Lilies that Fester. Fester,with its connotations of rot and decay, met with universal dislike from my long suffering family and friends who have been marvellous about reading my drafts - offering encouragement while showing restraint in the advice department - so I felt I had no choice than to drop my notion of giving my 'first born' a literary name. Anyway there's no two ways about it, I was reaching high for a sordid story about self-centred girls behaving badly.

For interest,the quote is from the Shakespearean sonnet about corruption, a personal favourite. The final powerful lines are spot on. I do believe the tall poppies of the world should lead by example. The greedy, corrupt practices of high flyers like Alan Bond, Steve Vizard, Martha Stewart and Ray Williams leave a bad smell as does Crystal, the anti-hero of The White Amah, as I ultimately christened my newborn.

'The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,

Though to itself, it only live and die,

But if that flower with base infection meet,

The basest weed outbraves his dignity:

For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;

Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.'

I wasn't being original in looking to the sonnets for inspiration. H.E. Bates did the same when he called his novel about the wonderful Larkin family: The Darling Buds of May.

'Rough winds do shake the darling buds of may,

And summer's lease has all too short a sway.'

Set in the idyllic Kentish countryside, the fresh faced farm girls are as far removed from Crystal as Raggedy Ann is to a Bratz Doll. But then, the Larkins lived in the fifties, at a time when television programs reflected values like honour, respect, love, trust and self sacrifice. Bland by today's viewers' standards, programs like Skippy, Ivanhoe, Leave it to the Beaver and Dixon of Dock Green modelled old fashioned values. Robin Hood might have worn tights but no one ever doubted Maid Marion was still virgin intacto, along with the greater part of the single female audience.

There has been an about face from the saccharine programs of the fifties to gritty realism accompanied by a decline in old fashioned values. Is repeated exposure to men and women behaving badly a major factor? Think of Survivor that promotes winning at any cost and rewards bullies and betrayers; consider housemates on Big Brother openly copulating on national television and the foul mouths of the doll- faced ladettes and then look around you. Am I wrong in thinking that the media normalises bad behaviour and encourages a cult of self interest?

I would be interested in your thoughts.

Ann Massey

http://www.annmasseyauthor.net/

Author of:

The White Amah, a mystery set against the backdrop of the timber logging industry in Malaysia. Sample or purchase: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456578065

The Biocide Conspiracy, a Young Adult thriller that sweeps readers into the world of biowarfare. Sample or purchase; http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456503367