Cyberpunk: Malaysia by Zen Cho

Cyberpunk: Malaysia Reviews

• 
  Fadzlishah Johanabas

  Like many other Malaysian Science Fiction fans, I was excited by the very thought of this anthology, which is the first--to my knowledge--Malaysian English Science Fiction anthology.
  
  I love the cover: plain foil that doubles as a murky mirror. Perhaps it's a nod to Mirrorshades, a Cyberpunk anthology published in 1986. The digital edition covers are pretty, too.
  
  Sadly, that's about the only positive thing I can say about this anthology, other than a few amazing stories that I'll mention in a bit. Most of the stories aren't even Science Fiction, much less Cyberpunk. They're merely General Fiction with robots and plasma guns thrown in so that they can pass off as SF. As a genre writer, this pisses me off. How can we expect Malaysian SF to be taken seriously?
  
  Well, on with my review of each story in the anthology.
  
  
  
  "Underneath Her Tudung"
  
  At its essence, this is a story about a young woman who is accepting her new existence as a cyborg. However, the storytelling is an absolute mess. It’s a Manglish fest, but the mangled English felt…forced, as if used for its effect. The story meanders and doesn’t have any focus at all. I’m not sure if using this story as the opening piece is a good idea. It definitely sets the book as Malaysian, though, both for its terrible Manglish, and for its unfocused storytelling.
  
  
  
  "Codes"
  
  It’s a story about a girl using a fake identity to bypass the restrictions set on Muslims. That ends in something completely off tangent and didactic. Another typical Malaysian storytelling, and forgettable.
  
  
  
  "Personal"
  
  I’m frustrated with this one. The writing is good and engaging, but the story doesn’t go anywhere. It’s about a woman’s fear of Personal Device theft—in other words, one’s entire digital signature is stolen. While the story goes on and on about that fear, as well as world building, it feels as though the real story is in the rushed and summarized ending scene.
  
  
  
  "Attack of the Spambots"
  
  A case of abused exclamation marks and misplaced colons. But. I can definitely see this one as an over-acted B-grade movie in SyFy, and it's a good thing. Sort of. The ending could have been expanded more, but overall, it’s a fun read—provided one doesn’t overanalyze things.
  
  
  
  "One Hundred Years: Machine"
  
  The first piece in this anthology that actually reads like Science Fiction. The way it’s told, written as a dissertation abstract, is also interesting and well-chosen. While most Cyberpunk stories are told from an underdog’s perspective, this one is told from the Man’s view. I like this one.
  
  
  
  "What the Andromaid Reads at Night"
  
  This story is told in a detached third person narration in line with the tradition of fables and folktales. It’s an example of plot-driven stories where characterization is secondary. It’s good that the writer doesn’t employ the Pinocchio trope. The andromaid doesn’t pretend to be human; it’s a robot discovering the wonders of Islam in a radically secular nation. It is, however, reminiscent of Chappie, especially with the identity/memory transfer.
  
  
  
  "Kakak"
  
  Take an Indonesian maid’s dilemma in newspapers and dramas, and you’ll get exactly the same story. This is nowhere near Science Fiction, much less Cyberpunk. I don’t know what this story is doing in this anthology.
  
  
  
  "The Wall that wasn’t a Wall"
  
  No robots or wearable/personalized technology in this piece, which is a breath of fresh air. Set in a dystopian future where some people are no better off than animals, it’s a decent read. However, the world building falls flat.
  
  
  
  "The Twins"
  
  THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEEN THE OPENING PIECE! Robots possessed by spirits? Yes! Tasteful garnishing of Manglish? Yes! Amazing storytelling? Yes! I love this story. If there is only one story I can recommend out of this anthology, “The Twins” is it. I look forward to reading more from the author.
  
  
  
  "October 11"
  
  I got bored reading this. The story is incomplete; it feels as though there should be a continuation after the reveal at the end of the story for it to have a complete arc.
  
  
  
  "Undercover in Tanah Firdaus"
  
  Almost two pages of backstory, which sets the world to something like Final Fantasy VII with its platform-city where the privileged enjoy luxuries and sunlight, while the undercity (slums) is in perpetual shadow. The story starts off slow, with plenty of acronyms and expositions and clunky world building, but it picks up when Inspector Moktar submits his holographic reports. I love this different format of storytelling, and how instead of the usual slum-is-bad-and-the-upper-society-needs-to-be-overtaken trope (think Elysium and In Time), this story shows the opposite. Despite the exposition at the beginning, this is a good and solid piece, one that doesn’t deserve to be buried in the middle of the anthology.
  
  
  
  "Unusual Suspects"
  
  Finally, a story in this anthology that reads like actual Science Fiction with a hard SF bent! I enjoyed the story…until the final scene, with its forced Manglish, because that’s how Malays talk, apparently, as opposed to the Caucasian protagonist. Ruined my reading experience. Gah!
  
  
  
  "The White Mask"
  
  The author has delivered another brilliant story. Take smart paint and graffiti artists who are anti-establishment, and we get an awesome Cyberpunk story right here. No robots are needed. I love how the story is told in fragmented streams of consciousness. Another solid piece.
  
  
  
  "Extracts From DMZine #13 (January 2115)"
  
  I feel like this “story” is smarter than I am. Interesting choice of formatting, but the articles appear disjointed & so unrelated that I think I’m missing something here. Worth a reread later.
  
  
  
  What I do notice in this anthology is that...I didn't detect any glaring typos. It is, however, severely underwhelming, and a disappointing read for an SFF fan. It's especially disappointing when Manglish is used for effect instead of effective communication, and good stories are buried in the middle of the anthology, in danger of not being read should people stop reading after the first few stories. Then again, these are my personal thoughts, and I do hope that others will love the entire book.
  
  After all, I do fervently hope that this will be the first Malaysian-English SF anthology, and not the only one.
• 
  Peter Tillman

  $4 ebook here:
  https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/cybe...
  Or here:
  https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...
  ebook not available from Amazon, 6-20
  
  First story, "Underneath Her Tudung" by Angeline Woon is available free on the preview @ kobo. Unfortunately, I gave up on it, and, after trying 3-4 other stories, found the Malaysian-English opaque. So I'm putting it aside. Not for me, I'm afraid. Oh, well. Maybe try more another time?
  
  But here's the editor's best story: The First Witch of Damansara. 5 stars! Wonderful story. Don't miss!
  
  https://uncannymagazine.com/article/f...
• 
  Chelsea Mcgill

  I must admit that before picking up this book I hadn't read anything marketed as "cyberpunk." I requested this book because I wanted to read some Malaysian science fiction. From this collection, I got the feeling that "cyberpunk" isn't my favorite sub-genre of SFF. That being said, I did enjoy this collection of short stories set in Malaysia of the future (or alternative present?). A majority made me think, like good speculative fiction should.
  
  There were two (related) things that made this collection difficult for me. First was that the authors tended to assume that the reader knew certain things about Kuala Lumpur or about Malaysian society. My knowledge of Malaysian society is scanty at best, so sometimes I had trouble understanding the references. A bit more description would have been helpful to smooth this out. (Since SFF usually creates an alternative reality, this is an important part of genre storytelling that sometimes felt missing in this anthology. When reading speculative fiction, I shouldn't have to know any background except what the author gives me - which wasn't the case for several of these stories.)
  
  Second, and related to the first, is that in several stories some of the most important lines are spoken in what I assume is Malay. At least, I guess that they're the most important lines. Having no background in the language, I was again left at a loss trying to figure out what they could possibly be saying. I think that this is partially because of Fixi Novo's publishing manifesto:\
  
  1. We believe that omputih/gwailoh-speak is a Malaysian language.
  5. We will not use italics for non-American/ non-English terms. This is because those words are not foreign to a Malaysian audience.... italics are a form of apology.
  
  While I understand these sentiments (and I applaud the publisher for saying in no uncertain terms that Malaysian words are not inferior to English ones!), it makes it difficult for a non-Malaysian reader to understand. Perhaps footnotes or endnotes explaining what the words mean would help? Or, since this is a speculative fiction book, the authors could have used the genre's techniques for introducing words from completely new languages. In other words, I totally understand why these Malaysian terms were used, but as a non-Malaysian reader I want to understand the stories too!
  
  Read the rest of the review, including my thoughts on each story, on my blog:
  http://thegloballycurious.blogspot.co...
• 
  Anna Tan

  I don't know if it's fair to rate a book that I have a story in, but well, I guess I'm rating all the stories in the book other than mine. =) Anyway, as much as I was hoping that I would fall desperately in love with Cyberpunk: Malaysia, I didn't. I liked it well enough. It's pretty decent. But it's not gripping. But as far as debut Malaysian Sci-Fi goes, it's a good offering. So that's 3.5 stars from me!
  
  ---
  
  There is a quote (I think) which says something about writers reflecting the state of their country through their stories. I think Cyberpunk: Malaysia does that. In imagining the near future, the writers in this anthology give vent to their worries about religion and religious control, the greed of our politicians, the growing racial divide, the growing economic divide, the burgeoning anger of the populace, the treatment of foreign workers and the polarizing effect of knowledge or the lack thereof.
  
  ---
  
  Likes:
  Attack of the spambots -
  Terence Toh
  What the andromaid reads at night -
  Ted Mahsun
  The wall that wasn't a wall -
  Kris Williamson
  The twins -
  Adiwijaya Iskandar
  October 11 - Chin Ai-May
  Undercover in Tanah Firdaus -
  Tina Isaacs
  Unusual suspects -
  Tariq Kamal
  The White Mask -
  Zedeck Siew
  
• 
  Firdaus Abu Bakar

  i am not impressed with "hey-we-can-see-the-future" type of stories in this collection but if i am destined live long enough, it would be great to have a grab of DMZINE #13 (JANUARY 2115).
• 
  Margaret

  The good (fun, humorous and experimental):
  
  The Andromaid Reads At Night
  Attack of the Spambots
  Extracts from DMzine
  The White Mask
  
  I am trying to sound positive but the other stories are not great. Some are like knock offs of recent science fiction films (especially parts of Undercover In Tanah Firdaus which may be better as a movie, because it read like a screenplay written by a teenager in a few hours and then cramped into a short story). Stories like Kakak, Codes and Personal treat maid abuse, identity theft and fakery as something very futuristic when its all already happening now, as if the writers did little research.
  
  Normally Fixi delivers solid story collections but this one was not one of them.
  
• 
  Anis Suhaila

  Cyberpunk was quite hard to finish as I'm not a fan of science-fiction/dystopian and there were just so many scientific terms (I know I should take the initiative to google).
  
  But I really loved the short stories which still highlighted the human nature, the human stories rather than focusing too much on the science of it all.
  
  My favourites were Sharmilla Ganesan's Personal for exaggerating the horror truth of our attachment to our devices and Ted Mahsun's What The Andromaid Reads at Night for showing us the possibility of a relationship between a robot and a human. Tina Isaac's Undercover In Tanah Firdaus reminds me a little bit of the Avatar film.
  
  There were a few hits and missed which what you would expect from an anthology.
• 
  Stephanie

  Book Riot RHC 2021 Task 10 - read an SFF anthology edited by a person of color
  
  There were a few good stories in this collection, but overall, it just wasn't for me.
• 
  Randall

  A neat collection of stories. The cyberpunk theme is fantastic and the Malaysian viewpoint is distinct, looking at cyberpunk through that different lens makes you think some. Some of the stories full flat, but overall I liked it.
• 
  Husna Nabila

  Brilliant! Some of the stories scared the sh*t out of me! Must read!
• 
  Kee Onn

  Most sci-fi short stories seek to highlight society's idiosyncrasies by casting them in a new light, emboldened by technology and leading readers to question if commonly accepted norms, are in fact somewhat peculiar? Cyberpunk: Malaysia is no exception. Employers holding up foreign workers' passports? How about giant towers that shoots lasers to anyone who dares escape the country?
  Neuro-spambots making everyone an extension of their companies? Corporate culture already took care of that. Enter the eerily prescient 'Insta-cast' story that predated the Stories of Instagram. Or literal social stratification where 'orang atas' lives on a higher plane separately from the 'Tanah' folks. These stories offer a creative, fresh take on Malaysian life and are fun to read.
• 
  Fadillah

  Is it cyberpunk? Some of it are close enough. Is it engaging and thrilling? I'd say majority of the featured stories indeed good. I am surprised to see the low rating by some of few readers but based on their review, i get why they gave such rating. It really is the matter of individual's preferences. I picked up this book because i just finished watching Black Mirror Netflix series last month. I don't expect it to be amazing and mind boggling like the TV show but yeah, this book has a few moments that brought me back to the certain black mirror's scenes. The first 2 stories didn't grip me at all. I decided to move on to the 3rd story and i decided if it's still lacking, I wanted to give up reading this book. Fortunately, the 3rd story managed to lure me back in. Overall, I'm rating this as 4 out 5 stars . People may not enjoy it as much as i did but i glad i bought this on Google playbook.
  
  Here's my favorite list of stories :
  1. Personal by Sharmilla Ganesan
  2. Attack of the spambots by Terrence Toh
  3. What the andromaids read at night by Ted Mahsun
  4. Kakak by William Tham Wai Liang
  5. October 11 by Chin Ai May
  6.The White Mask by Zedeck Siew
  7. Extracts from DMZINE by Foo Sek Han
  
  The rest of the stories didn't sit well with me. I didn't despise them but i didnt enjoy them either.
  
  Sidenote: I couldn't help but notice how "Tanah Firdaus" resembles the concept of High Rise (both book and movie) but I could be wrong though.
• 
  the Kent cryptid

  I wondered while reading this whether cyberpunk can ever be hopeful? There was one optimistic story in this collection but otherwise it was all pretty grim. I guess it's the nature of the genre, but maybe it's time for cyberpunk which looks at the ways technology can enhance people's lives rather than plunging everyone into an immediate dystopia. There were some interesting ideas here, but also some stuff that felt dated and repetitive.
• 
  Grace

  To b fair, Cyber is not a particular genre of interest- difficult to digest towards the end. Abstracts of a post modernistic Malaysia and creative- weird futuristic concepts somewhat made my eyelids heavy and mouth a perpetual "O" shape... Of course literary/ writing skills are pretty good... Just not enough to make it a mouth watering page turner. There r other better Fixi short story books one shelf I would happily reread. Not this one.
• 
  William Liang

  Disclaimer: I got featured in this collection
  
  So while cyberpunk isn't really my thing, I did enjoy quite a few stories in the collection-my particular favourite was Foo Sek Han's 'Extracts from DMZine': funny, dystopian, tragic, irreverent while remaining poignant in a strange way. It was a pretty good read overall.
• 
  Kam-Hung Soh

  Many of stories require some development (it's not interesting to read some scene setting and a conclusion). The more memorable stories question or satirise the conventions of Malaysian society, such as whether an android who self-identifies as a woman still needs to wear a tudung (head scarf) over her motile nano-tech hair and zombie humans spamming people with advertising.
• 
  declis

  The cover of the book is really pretty and special, I've never seen it before. I'm not sure about some short stories, most of them were strange and I didn't understand them. But 3 or 4 were really good. It's a nice collection of cyberpunk short stories, respect for the work.
• 
  Zara

  Not going to lie... I wasn't expecting much but I was impressed by this bunch of stories. Always great to read speculative fiction set in a place I am familiar with, especially when it incorporates our very special culture.
• 
  Kara

  
  Robots and AI's and cyborgs, oh my!
  
  Sci-fi stories of all that can go wrong and right with computers set in Malaysia. Not all the stories were my cup of tea - some skewed heavily dystopian - but I loved seeing sci-fi from a different point of view.
• 
  Lesley

  As with most short story collections, some worked (at least for me) better than others, but overall worth reading. (Maybe three and half.)
• 
  Sammi Lim

  Ipoh white coffee pills... Someday a possibility? I mean there's caffeinated peanut butter now.
• 
  Dot Matrix

  Any collection is going to have better stories and ones that are not so good. There are some clunkers in here, but there are some brilliantly horrifying ones too, ones that fully deserve the title cyberpunk (I say this as someone who is frustrated with the tendency to add "punk" to everything as if that is anything other than a marketing ploy).
  The two (or maybe two and a half) gleaming jewels make this book absolutely worth reading.
• 
  feux d'artifice

  wow, this anthology was a roller coaster of emotions. will rate and give thoughts on each short story later