Singapore Through 19th Century Photographs
Jason Toh
Singapore: Editions Didier Millet, 2009
ISBN: 9789814260060

Singapore Through 19th Century Photographs is a comprehensive photographic record of Singapore from the early 1840s to the 1900s. Paired with lively commentary, the more than 120 rare photographs from leading institutional and private collections recreate a compelling portrait of 19th century Singapore.

Emphasising the topographical and architectural landscape of the city and its surrounding environs, this visually irresistible city tour transports the reader back to the Singapore of an earlier age, a city that has now changed beyond recognition. The vibrant old metropolis is brought back to life through insightful captions and mostly albumen prints, the dominant photographic medium of the second half of the 19th century.

Moreover, also documenting the growth of photography in Southeast Asia, this book reveals a watershed moment. The rise of international trade and the push for immigration led many Western studio photographers to seek their fortunes in the East, during a period that coincided with a rise in tourist travel, sparked by improvements to transportation networks. These propitious conditions set the stage for intense production of commercial photographs of Singapore, and the book captures this unique moment of rapid development, both with the photographs shown and the perceptive analysis offered in the text.

Illustrating the city at its most striking, Singapore Through 19th Century Photographs records a dynamic moment of development for both photography and of Singapore, the pre-eminent port-city of Southeast Asia.

CultureShock!: A Survival Guide to Customs and Etiquette: Singapore [2nd ed.]
Marion Bravo-Bhasin
USA: Marshall Cavendish, 2009
ISBN: 9780761456766

CultureShock! Singapore takes you inside the tiny island nation at the tip of the Malaysian archipelago and pulls back the veneer on a country that is both Asian and Western at the same time. Discover how this multi-racial society manages to work like clockwork despite its disparate backgrounds, and find out how to deal with the people's kiasu attitude. Through this book - filled with practical information and tips for everyday living - you will learn more about the different local and ethnic customs and beliefs, and be introduced to its diverse and mouth-watering cuisine. CultureShock! Singapore is the definitive read for anyone who wants to settle easily into Singaporean society and it will have you understanding Singlish in no time.

Interlogue: Studies in Singapore Literature: Volume 8: Interviews II
Ronald D. Klein (ed.)
Singapore: Ethos Books, 2009
ISBN: 9789810835910

In this volume of 12 interviews, Professor Ronald D. Klein includes the insights of critic Ong Sor Fern, the background and thoughts of poets like Felix Cheong, Madeleine Lee and Yong Shu Hoong, playwright Ovidia Yu, short story writer Jeffrey Lim and filmmaker Eric Khoo. David Leo and Alfian Sa'at, who write in several genres, are also included. Interviews with Ng Yi-Sheng, Daren Shiau and Cyril Wong complete this volume.

This is an important book for readers who wish to know more about contemporary Singapore writing.

Criminal Intent: True Stories From Changi Prison
Wong Kim Hoh
Singapore: Marshall Cavendish, 2009
ISBN: 9789812618894

Criminal Intent: True Stories From Changi Prison tells the stories behind the crimes committed by 12 inmates currently incarcerated in Changi Prison.

Written by veteran Straits Times journalist Wong Kim Hoh, the accounts as told by the inmates of their modus operandi and the reasons behind them, all make compelling reading.

Commissioned by the Singapore Prison Service, the cases include outrage of modesty, robbery, cheating and rape. With a foreword by Ng Joo Hee, Director of Prisons.

Men In White: the Untold Story of Singapore's Ruling Political Party
Sonny Yap, Richard Lim, and Leong Weng Kam
Singapore: Marshall Cavendish, 2009
ISBN: 9789814266246

Men In White is the inside story of one of the world's most successful political parties - the ruling People's Action Party of Singapore. With its victory in the 2006 polls, PAP has won 12 successive general elections since it assumed power in 1959.

Narrated in three parts, it chronicles the rise, fall, capture, split and rise of a political party which has become synonymous with the spellbinding success of Singapore, and delves into the reasons for its track record and longevity.

Part One tells how Lee Kuan Yew and his anglicised associates collaborated with radical Chinese-speaking trade unionist to form a small left-wing party in 1954 to drive out the British colonialists and how they fell out over the issue of merger with Malaya.

Part two captures the agonies of leadership self-renewal.

Part Three wraps up the PAP story by tracing the origins and discussing some of the key principles that characterised Singapore governance.

Voice of Malayan Revolution: The CPM Radio War Against Singapore and Malaysia, 1969-1981
Wang Gungwu & Ong Weichong (eds.)
Singapore: S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, 2009
ISBN: 9789810836399

Voluminous works - popular and academic - have been written on how the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) lost the shooting war in the Malayan Emergency (1948-1960). But much less has been said on what happened thereafter. By 1960, the CPM's "long march" from the Malayan interior into Southern Thailand was complete. In a sanctuary far from the writ of the Malaysian and Thai governments, the CPM reorganised, reviewed their strategy and bided their time. In 1968, inspired by the Cultural Revolution in Red China and events in Indochina, the CPM sought for a second time to establish a "People's Republic" in the Malay Peninsula. From 1968 to 1989, the Malaysian security forces and the CPM once again confronted each other in jungles of the Malaysian-Thai border in what was known as the Second Emergency.

In an attempt to subvert the populations of Malaysia and Singapore and win them over to their revived revolutionary cause, the CPM embarked on a clandestine radio war. From a Chinese military base in Hunan, China, the CPM's underground radio network transmitted under the codename Project 691 and on the airwaves as "Suara Revolusi Malaya" or "Voice of Malayan Revolution" (VMR).

This edited volume, for the very first time, reproduces a selection of those broadcasts. These hitherto classified transcripts of the Internal Security Department, Singapore, are supplemented with an introductory essay and chapter introductions that seek to situate the selected documents against the revolutionary events of the 60s and 70s not only in Singapore and Malaysia but the whole of Southeast Asia. This selection is accompanied by a CD containing all available transcripts of VMR broadcasts made form its very first broadcast in 1969 to its very last in 1981.

Far from being a spent force, the CPM had the capacity and resources to revive their ideological struggle against the newly emergent post-colonial states of Malaysia and Singapore for another 12 long years. This edited volume is part of that story.