THE SELF-OBSESSED TRIVIA: Things you should know about...

Hi, gaisss (dengan suara Khairul Aming).

I know I promised I will do this in October, and this is already 20th October, so let's get into it. (Makcik dah tua, dah tak reti nak tulis intro panjang2. (For more self-obsessed trivia for other novels, click on the label at the end of the post). Hence...

1. Petrichor ditulis pada pertengahan tahun 2022. It started sometime in 2021, but I abandoned it (as I always do), and then one day one of Alaf's editors, Kak Awin called dan kata Alaf nak novel baru. "Sila hantar manuskrip." Mind you, selama ni makcik tak pernah diberi deadline eh, sebab tu novel aku keluar tiga tahun sekali... ahahaha. I started writing it again while attending PBAKL 2022. Usually aku boleh je menulis di rumah, tapi kali ni, I know I wouldn't be able to do it what with my parents calling my name every minute of every day, so I took a week off translation work, packed my bags, and spent a week di Hotel Seri Pacific KL on my own, trying to finish a manuscript. In the end aku cuma berjaya tulis 80 pages, and the rest of it I had to do at home in the end at 3AM every day for four straight months. So, in short, takyahlah mengada2 nak book hotel untuk tulis novel kekonon. Alasan.

2. Tajuk original, as in working title is "Bintang & Kentang". Editor ai masa tu Kak Awin sangatlah tak berkenan dengan tajuk tu. Ahahahaha. It sounds stupid, I know, but it's because Bintang itu di langit, way up high, dan Kentang duduk dalam tanah, way down. It marks the difference between kedudukan Haque di mata orang ramai dan kedudukan Jamie. In the end Shida (the editor who ended up editing the manuscript) chose Petrichor, which is one of my suggested title. Why Petrichor? Sebab the story is as much Jamie's story as it is Sameera. She finds her Petrichor by being HIS Petrichor. Other suggested titles include "Zuhal & Jupiter", as well as "Sameera Ad Astra".

3. Nama Haque Zuhal memang inspired by Bruno Mars, sebab aku nak nama yang paling over-the-top artithhhhh. It was SUPPOSED to be extremely annoying. Meanwhile, I chose nama Dahlia Everett based on how many Pan Asian actresses we have, like Anna Jobling, Amelia Henderson, Zahirah McWilson as well as how many other artistes guna nama Inggeris dalam nama diorang even though diorang bukan Pan Asian pun. ahahaha. But no, I did not use them as inspiration for the character. That would be unfair to them, since they did nothing wrong. I was just using the fact that we have a lot of Pan Asian actresses now, so the logical thing is to have another one. (Disclaimer: Masa tu saya tidak tahu kewujudan Dahlia Rizal. Makcik bukan tengok TV atau socmed sangat.)

4. Just like all of my other novels where I use names of important women in Islam sebagai nama watak utama, this time, nama Sameera comes from Sameera Moussa, who is... eh baca sendirilah kat SINI. Meanwhile, nama Jamie comes from my love for Jaime Lannister (THE BOOK NOT THE SERIES), whom I think, in essence, is a product of Cersei's abuse and manipulation. Sebab tu kengkadang aku sendiri terkonpius dengan ejaan nama Jamie tu.

Book Jaime Lannister is a victim of abuse. You can't change my mind!

5. Jamie muncul awal as an inside joke with my older readers, sebab readers who have been with me since day one selalu bising kata aku suka letak hero hujung2, dan tak puas dgn babak diorang. ha hamik, makcik letak di bab pertama. ahahahaha.

6.  While tak pernah alami any kind of abuse myself, I relied to some friends and several cases of abuse that I have read or watch (makcik sesungguhnya kaki tengok crime shows) untuk create Jamie's way of dealing with it. Dalam filem, selalu sangat orang kena abuse ni menangis la apa lah. But in truth, people who are abused or have trauma taught themselves to keep their emotion inside. Most of them either tell their story with no emotion in their face, atau in some cases, they joke about it, because joking is the only way they know how to cope. Most of the time they "go away" atau "go deep into themselves" as they share their story. I wanted to be as legit in expressing it as I can.

I thought I was being creative, 
turns out, there is a restaurant that sells
rendang ravioli called Shells Artisan Foods

7. The hardest part of writing this book is not researching abuse. Yang tu banyak references boleh guna. Yang susah ialah mereka cipta hidangan fusion dan mereka cipta produk untuk sebuah kampeni jual kari. I have never seen a rendang ravioli before. I just made that up. But then as I was writing the book, I found out, ehhhh ada rupa2nya chef yang pernah create rendang ravioli. Whad'ya know. 

8. As usual, macam dalam novel2 lain, ada watak novel lama muncul dalam novel kali ini, and this time it is Fish, and it is suitable memandangkan in Uncle Bos Mama, Fish's sister was also a victim of abuse, so she would have the most knowledge about it. 

9.  "Seorang ibu adalah pertahanan akhir seorang anak" was the words from my best friend Munira while we were discussing about another friend's brother. The whole point of the line was that even when the world doesn't believe you and think you are the villain, your mum should be the only person who would defend you to the bitter end. Meanwhile, "Power doesn't corrupt, it reveals" is not my actual words. It's political writer Robert Caro's words. The long version of it is:

10. I enjoyed the most emulating things like komen2 netizen terpaling, because it's verrry typical. All you need to do is go to Instagram artis/influencer yang kau rasa paling selalu kena kecam, and then you emulate the comments. 

11. The restaurant where Sameera first met Jamie is actually in SS15 Subang Jaya. They have these Korean tables (kau kena bersila) and ada tirai yang tutup untuk bagi ko privacy. It is called K-Street, but sadly it has permanently closed. I missed their bibimbap so muchhhhh. 

They have these seating areas with curtains for privacy

12. Despite Sameera's love of Korean food, I have to make a disclaimer here. I. Was. Not. Inspired. By. Any. Korean. Drama. The last modern Korean drama I watched was "The Producer". The last period drama I watched was "Kingdom". It is slightly irritating for me when people think I am inspired by some Korean drama... because this is how I originally am. This is how I have been writing my book since my first book was published in 2007. This has always been the kind of stories I tell since 2007. I was just not very well-known. That's all. Ahahaha.

13. This is an inflatable dinosaur costume 👇. Thank you.

14. People asked me why Sameera acts how she acts after being dumped. It's because she's 35 and I am 40. If you want a more vengeful character, let me introduce you to Wulan of "3 Hati", a 27-year-old character I wrote when I was 29. You must love her. She pours petrol into a diesel tank. That's how petty she is. Ahaha. And if you ask me why Jamie acts the way he acts, let me introduce to you the MEN ABUSED BY WOMEN booklet.

Wulan is the epitome of petty revenge

15. When I wrote PETRICHOR, the plan was for it to be the final novel I would write. I thought, I wouldn't care what people would say about it. I was ready to "clock out". I thought that 16 years would be enough for me, because writing has not been fruitful anymore. It takes a lot of time and it pays almost nothing. And with my dad's health situation, I didn't think that it would be right for me to use my free time to write a book instead of doing jobs that pay better. Little did I know that it would go viral, and got picked up by a producer in the second month of its release. It was almost funny to think about it. I am thankful, of course. But at the same time like, "Really? Really, universe?"

Untuk pembelian, click HERE, or HERE or whatsapp my agent HERE

SHAI ADA NOVEL BARU, NAMA DIA PETRICHOR... HAHAHA

Hi hi!!! It's the time of the year(s)...

...di mana Shai update blog hanya untuk announce there is a new novel.

Ketika Sameera terima Ishaak jadi teman lelakinya di usia 17 tahun, dia sedikit pun tak menyangka bahawa pemuda kurus kering itu akan suatu hari jadi Haque Zuhal, bintang pujaan ramai, yang lagu-lagunya akan berkumandang di corong radio, yang dramanya dimainkan di televisyen, dan yang wajahnya akan menghiasi papan-papan iklan di lebuh raya.

“Meera tunggu saya, ya? Meera sabar, ya?”

Jadi, apabila Haque jatuh cinta dengan wanita lain dan membuat keputusan hubungan mereka harus putus di tengah jalan ketika dia berusia 35 tahun, Sameera harus berhadapan dengan banyak cabaran yang menjengkelkan yang tak dihadapi wanita patah hati yang lain, daripada para netizen yang banyak spekulasi, tumpuan umum yang tak dikehendaki, hinggalah wajah dan suara Haque yang tertampal dan berkumandang di merata tempat.

Jadi dia kemas barang, pindah ke rumah sepupunya Mirah, bekerja di syarikat lain, dan cuba meneruskan hidupnya. Dia cuba mengaburi pandangan matanya dan menutup telinganya daripada terus dimaklumkan dengan kebahagiaan baharu bekas kekasihnya.

"Saya tak perlukan satu Malaysia beri komen tentang hidup saya. Saya tak mahu orang yang tak dikenali datang dan tepuk belakang saya dengan muka simpati... Saya cuma nak hidup."

Dalam usahanya untuk cuba mencari maksud hidup sebagai seorang manusia yang tak pernah jadi wanita single selama 18 tahun, Sameera harus menghadapi pelbagai jenis manusia, daripada Puan Saidah yang masih enggan menerima hakikat dia tidak akan bermenantukan selebriti terkenal, Ned si PA Haque yang masih mengingatkan Sameera tentang lelaki itu, Gosmer1018 yang begitu taasub dengan kisah cintanya, sehinggalah ke Jamie, yang punya sejarah hitamnya sendiri, sejarah hitam yang turut merubah hidup Sameera.

“Awak tahu apa itu petrichor? Petrichor ialah bau segar yang muncul selepas turunnya hujan. Tapi satu-satunya cara untuk bau segar tu datang ialah dengan membiarkan tanah yang kering dibasahi hujan."

Novel dah open for preorder. Boleh beli di sini , kat sini ataupun WhatsApp Abang Long di sini

blu eyes

 The only days that I'm not stressed

Are days I work myself to death
And I'm too tired to feel anything else

Even then, I'm restless in my sleep
My worries bleed into my dreams and I
Wake up and do it all again

Maybe it's the way I was raised
Or how I'm wired in my brain but
I never seem to be
Enough for me

Is it normal
The way I can't help second guessing
Is it normal
Wishing I could put my thoughts to bed
And be in the moment
For just a moment
Cuz it feels like I'm always somewhere else instead
Is it normal
How I get stuck in my head

I bite my lip and twist my hair
Scroll through my phone or sit and stare at nothing
Trying to chase my train of thought

Tell everybody that I'm doing okay
Make it look good and hope that one of these days
It won't be a lie

Is it normal
The way I can't help second guessing
Is it normal
Wishing I could put my thoughts to bed
And be in the moment
For just a moment
Cuz it feels like I'm always somewhere else instead
Is it normal
How I get stuck in my head

Is it normal

The way I can't help second guessing
Is it normal
Wishing I could put my thoughts to bed
And be in the moment
For just a moment
Cuz it feels like I'm always somewhere else instead
Is it normal
How I get stuck in my head

KENAPA ADA MASANYA AKU SUKA/DUKA

Did I write another e-book? Yes, I did.

Why? Sebab aku banyak idea yang takcukup kuat untuk jadi novel penuh, dan rasa kesian dengan watak2 dalam otak aku yang kekal dalam otak aku sebab tak ada tempat nak dilepaskan. I am thankful that I finally found E-Sentral, where I can finally give them the place to go.

Apa ada dalam ADA MASANYA AKU SUKA/DUKA? Lima cerita, serta bonus cerpen tentang karakter2 dr "MIE & YOU" (Click HERE to buy). Cerita tentang wanita yang ditinggalkan, cerita tentang gadis yang naif, cerita tentang rakan-rakan yang jengkel, cerita tentang lelaki yang pening, dan kisah perempuan yang menyibuk. 

Will there be another one? Planningnya nak keluarkan satu lagi koleksi cerpen akhir tahun ni, kalau berkesempatan.

Bila nak keluar physical book? Bukan tak nak keluarkan, tapi industri buku sangat teruk sekarang dan pandemik made it worse, dan banyak lagi penulis yang tunggu giliran buku keluar. I realised even if I send one now, it would take a looooong time before it comes out. Maybe 2022 or 2023. So for now, ebook it is. Memang banyak benda nak kena belajar, tapi pandemik ni mengajar aku yang you just have to learn new things. Norma baharu, yo.

Adakah kau rindu nak jumpa readers and promote buku mcm dulu2? SANGATTTTTTT. Tapi tulah... haih... but I still continue to read all messages and reviews, baik dan buruk, and thankful kepada semua yang masih sudi beli buku Nurul Syahida/Shai Kamarudin ni.

Kenapa guna nama Shai Kamarudin? Memang sejak dulu lagi nak guna nama tu instead of Nurul Syahida. Tapi dulu masa join Buku Prima, diorang tak berapa nak ngam dengan nama Shai Kamarudin tu sebab time tu penulis semua guna nama gempak. Memandangkan aku tanak nama gempak, aku kata "Guna ajelah nama sebenar". Ahahaha. So now I finally got to use the name that I have always wanted to use. Yay!

Kenapa guna tajuk ADA MASANYA AKU SUKA/DUKA? Sebab nak bagi muat cover. Ya, itu aje alasannya. Aku nak cover tu penuh dengan tajuk and it was the first thing that came to my mind that fit the whole cover. I am a simple writer with simple reasons for doing things. Ahaahaha.

Di mana nak dapatkan ADA MASANYA AKU SUKA/DUKA? Di E-Sentral! Hanya perlu download apps e-sentral reader di Google Playstore, and then boleh baca buku anda offline through your phone or laptop. 

*Download esentral HERE
*Boleh beli ADA MASANYA AKU SUKA/DUKA HERE only at RM10!

THE SELF-OBSESSED TRIVIA: Things you should know about...

For more Self-Obsessed Trivia, click on the tag below...

1. UNCLE BOS MAMA was written during one of the toughest period of my life... dealing with dad's chronic kidney disease and becoming his official carer, losing one of my freelance jobs (which means a loss of income), dealing with anxiety, etc. It was similar to when I was writing AKU KAN NOVELIS, which came while I was dealing with a court case and another loss of job and mild depression. I guess losing a source of income and emotional instability always leads to a book?

2. I saw this photo

Somehow I thought that Brienne of Tarth being a "guardian" to the three Stark kids is funny, so I decided to write a story about a single woman who has to take care of three children... and then I was like, why three? Let's do four! It also is a change from my previous stories about women needing to be strong. Fish is already a strong woman. It is established from the start. It's "I am already a strong independent woman. What then?"

3. Fish's job was my first job at CINEMA ONLINE. I was an admin assistant who was part receptionist part secretary whose job was attending to people coming to the office, ordering food or booking venues for my boss Marcel, buat invois dan purchase order, follow-up payment, tolong Kak Ani uruskan cheques, urus subscription, dan sebagainya (termasuk betulkan flush jamban and pasang starter lampu) before I moved to partly-editorial-partly-marketing. Ahahahaha. But Marcel is no Joshua though. That would be disturbing in a lot of ways. In a way, even the whole office (kecuali bahagian luar dan parking) kinda inspired by CO's layout masa aku masih kerja kat sana. 

You can say that KUACI MEDIA was my love letter to CINEMA ONLINE of some sort. 

Small trivia: My favourite job was picking contest winners.

4. I was also inspired by my friend Masitah, who single-handedly raised her three boys sambil bekerja, buat bisnes, layan anak bersukan, etc. I don't think I could ever do what she does. I don't think I am strong enough.

5. I was listening to Postmodern Jukebox version of Beauty and the Beast while writing Chapter 53. If u dunno, PMJ is this YouTube channel and band that covers pop songs, tapi diorang nyanyi semula dengan jukebox version. Truth be told, I had been listening to a lot of PMJ while writing the book. My favourite song that they covered include "Creep", "Juice", "Toxic" and "All of Me". I actually listened to "All of Me" while writing Joshua's confession to Fish about wanting her to be greedy. And I was listening to Beauty & The Beast while writing that scene of them in the car after the karaoke. 

6. KUACI.com adalah antara nama yang suggested bila Cinema Online nak buat website pasal wayang dalam versi BM (Cinema Online was in English). It was proposed by another one of our bosses Vinsen, sebab katanya kuaci adalah snek pilihan bila tgk movie pada zaman dulu (dan pilihan snek bila tgk TV), dan semua kaum - whether it be Malays, Chinese, or Indians - think kuaci as their staple snack. In the end we used TUPAI instead (sekarang website ni dah tak wujud dah). But in my mind, I have always loved the whole notion of KUACI bringing races together.

7. I never said Joshua was Chinese. I never mentioned his last name, or whether he could be a Christian or a Buddhist if he ever was religious, or his features dan warna kulit. Tujuannya sebab aku nak tengok bila aku create character yang tak ada bangsa dan agama, apa yang readers akan fikir. Tapi ramai yang sangka Joshua Chinese kerana dia dari Penang. Ada yang bagi reason sebab bapak dia ada kilang and business empire and usually bangsa cina sahaja yang banyak buat bisnes dan ada kilang sendiri. Isn't that interesting, how we kinda link one thing to another like that? In my mind, Joshua was never Chinese. He was never Indian, Bugis, or Caucasian. He's just Joshua. Mungkin mak dia Kadazandusun dan bapak dia half Mamak half British for all I know. Haha.

8. Originally, I planned to have the story be about Joshua tolong selesaikan kes kakak Fish dan help get her out of prison. But that would take ratusan pages yang tak mungkin editor aku benarkan, dan a lot of legal terms dan research. I just want Joshua to be someone who can be Fish's ally, and there is a simpler way to show his kindness than the grand gesture of keluarkan someone dari penjara. And it would be much more tragic to see how a woman can end up in misery bila buat pilihan yang salah, and how Fish learned from that to be who she is as a person. It is indeed Fish's story, bukan cerita Hani.

9. While writing the four kids, I spent a lot of time observing and remembering how kids of those age talk. Shairil was supposed to be more mature than his age disebabkan tragedi yang berlaku padanya, so that's why he doesn't sound 13. Shaina... I just observe my younger cousins Hazirah dan Shazrina (dan how Hazirah usually bergaduh dengan adiknya Ejal). Faiq, I tried to remember Erfaan dan Adam - the sons of one of my best friend and how they were during that age. As for Lala, who seems to be everyone's favourite... she was based on my neighbour's kid named Alisya, yang selalu bergaduh dengan another one of my neighbour's kid Muqrie. She was that kind of kid.

10. Tajuk asal UNCLE BOS MAMA was........ Joshua & Keluarga Fish......
Because I suck.

11. This is Fish's house di Kelana Jaya. I mean, when I describe it, it's similar to this. Tak ada sebarang reason, except for I was looking for a house untuk dijadikan rujukan rumah Fish di area Kelana Jaya, and this house seemed fitting. It seemed like a dream house of a normal family (Hani dan Arif) but became such an annoyance untuk bayaran bulanan for someone like Fish who has a wheelchaired boy staying with her. I even described the tree. Hahaha. Can you imagine Lala climbing the wall to talk to the neighbour next door?

11. I am tired of women being antagonists in love stories (I am also guilty of doing so in the past) sebab tu dalam UBM, tak ada watak perempuan yang jahat. Elanne ada hak untuk marah Joshua and mengamuk disebabkan apa yang Joshua buat. 

12. Balkis dan Apis Milo played a prominent part in this book because... I have a soft spot for the two of them sebab PLAIN JANE adalah novel pertama di mana editor bagi aku ruang untuk be as creative as I want as a storyteller, membolehkan aku jumpa aku punya trademark dalam penulisan. Do they only have one kid? Yes. Why? Sometimes people just do. 

13. Nama Shaina Shairil dan Shaila bukan ilham datang dari nama gelaran aku SHAI. I just wanted to make this whole thing where Fish and Josh called them "Adik Beradik Shai-tan". But then my editor was like "Absolutely not!"... so... Nama penuh Shaila ialah Shaila Ain. It was never mentioned because there was no reason to mention her full name, unlike Shaina Amani (in that chapter where she told Joshua to name his kid Amani instead of Shaina) and Shairil Azim (in that chapter where the school called Fish about his accident).

14. The name Naila Farafisha is of course a part of the tradition where I named all my female protagonists by the name of wanita2 dalam Islam. Naila Al-Farafishah was Uthman bin Affan's wife who.... eh baca sendirilah sejarah dia. And my group of pals from school, we like to call ourselves the Farafishahs, and kekonon kalau ada anak perempuan nak bagi nama Nailah Farafishah. Beranganla kau di situ.... As for Joshua.... it just came out of my head and refused to be renamed. I have no other reason for him to be named Joshua. I know the origin of the name Joshua, and yet even when I tried to change it, my brain won't let it. So we got stuck with Joshua. Oh and the name Elanne was taken from that Hong Kong actress Elanne Kong. I don't know why. Sometimes my brain wants something, and I just be like, "Okay fine!"

15. Asalnya setiap chapter ikut point of view Joshua atau Fish dan setiap bab bermula dengan nama diorang (for example - Bab 1 - JOSHUA. Bab 2 - FISH). It was significant as the only person who has POV chapters are the two of them except for one chapter, near the end, where I put SHAINA as the POV character to signify how it all came together. Tapi mungkin benda tu annoying untuk dimasukkan bila publisher reka tataletak, so in the end POV tu hilang.

16. I know for a fact ada vending machine jual larva tebuan dan belalang dalam tin di Inokashira Park di Jepun kerana aku pernah tengok video YouTube Safiya Nygaard about it. Hahahaha. 

17. Joshua likes Salmon Quiche kat GLORIA JEAN'S COFFEES sebab itulah benda yang aku beli setiap kali aku kena gi AVISENA utk appointment doktor. You know me. I am that kind of writer.  

18. Rumah Joshua was partly inspired by my friend Nadiah's apartment di Dwiputra in Putrajaya, except in my mind it was bigger, darker toned, with wooden tiles and sleek style.

19. One more thing, selain Balkis n Apis, as usual mcm yg aku buat dengan novel2 lain, aku masukkan watak novel lain dalam UBM. This time Kat dan FU from Awak Sungguh Perfect. See if u can find the easter egg.

You can buy your copy of UNCLE BOS MAMA here or whatsapp Abang Long at 019-2254910/Wana at 011-21226461

For more reviews of UNCLE BOS MAMA, read here