June 2014

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ARTS&LEISURE
If you're looking for a good
read this month, here are our
thoughts on a selection of
recent releases. PAGE
June14
Expat Women: Confessions
Andre Martins and Victoria Hepworth
Expat Women Enterprises | 267 pages
Available from
My own confession is that I was looking
forward to a collection of salacious
revelations – perhaps involving a hunky
pool-cleaner, a slim-hipped personal
trainer, or a hotel courtyard indiscretion
brought on by a free-flow Champagne
brunch. Never judge a book by its lurid
pink cover, as they say.
Subtitled “50 Answers to Your Real-Life
Questions about Living Abroad”, this is
actually a serious and useful guide for
expatriate women all over the world. It’s
full of real-life examples of the difficulties
that expats face, and I was surprised to
discover how universal many of these
problems are.
Aussie Andrea Martins is the founder
and director of expatwomen.com, and
has lived in Jakarta, Mexico City and
Once Upon a Timepiece
Starr Wood
Bo Tree Books | 167 pages
Available from Amazon, and at Tango Mango,
Tanglin Mall
onceuponatimepiece.com
This is something unusual: a novel made up of 12
short stories. Each story can be read on its own,
each having a distinct plot and an unexpected twist
at the end. That’s what I meant to do – savour them
one at a time, but the stories are all connected to
tell a bigger narrative, and I gobbled up the lot over
a couple of days. (So did my mother.)
Set in England in 2012, it moves through the
months of the year, with a different story and cast
of characters for each tale, all linked through the continuously changing ownership
of a 1946 Breitling watch.
Starr Wood is a seductive writer with a wonderful command of his art. Not only does
this work prove him a master of the short story genre, but its sensitive and intelligent
exploration of the underlying themes of time and temporality makes it one of the
most satisfying reads I have enjoyed for a long time. I can’t wait for his next book.
Verne Maree
This is the debut novel fromStarr
Wood, who was born in the UK
in 1970, grew up “all over the
place” as an expat child, and
has lived and worked here in
Singapore since 2002 as a
journalist and economist.
now Kuala Lumpur. Kiwi psychologist
Victoria Hepworth has lived in Miyazaki,
Shanghai, Saint Petersburg, Gothenburg
and Mumbai, and now lives in Dubai.
They answer 50 wide-ranging questions
that have come from women who find
themselves in hugely diverse places,
from a small village in Finland to St
Petersburg in Russia; one is from a Dane
trying to adjust to life in Japan with her
Japanese husband, another has special-
needs children and wonders about the
wisdomof relocating to Central America.
Apar t from more immediately
recognisable issues such as culture
shock, dealing with family back home,
angsty teenage children, finances and
work-life balance, they also cover more
delicate areas such as alcoholism, marital
infidelity and divorce. Generally upbeat
and encouraging, the advice is also
comprehensive, often suggestinga variety
of options and practical steps to take.
Verne Maree