Book preview: Heartwarming feedback

11 March 2023 update: Books Kinokuniya in Singapore has stocked Pukul Habis. Please visit its main store in Ngee Ann City or Bugis Junction, or check the Kinokuniya online store here. The title should be available via Kinokuniya Malaysia soon. Please enquire with the KL store.

1 December 2022 update:

Available from Amazon sites that serve your location. "Look Inside" function on some sites shows sample pages.

Singapore: https://bit.ly/3XJzInH

Australia: https://amzn.to/3ViaX0i

Canada: https://amzn.to/3VkjqQP Look Inside

France: https://amzn.to/3uenBS5 Look Inside

Germany: https://amzn.to/3XLcJc0 Look Inside

Japan: https://amzn.to/3gS2Loz Look Inside

Spain: https://amzn.to/3OSfi7S

Sweden: https://bit.ly/3GWq7UI

United Kingdom: https://amzn.to/3EZ6clA Look Inside

USA: https://amzn.to/3Ui3Eo1 Look Inside

The most heartwarming feedback I received from the select group of test readers came from a senior official in Kuala Lumpur (KL) who suggested naming a character in the book after his daughter.

He had read my cover email to the draft. In it, I casually mentioned that I was open to suggestions for a name for one of the characters because the one in the draft manuscript didn't resonate with me - I chose it at random from a Malaysian news site.

After the KL official read the draft, he replied with the name you see in the image above. He then suggested some revisions to the manuscript for accuracy. I guess he liked what he saw?

Writing a fictional war story was a new experience for me. To develop the story, I had to populate the alternate reality with imaginary scenarios and people, name them, choose their ranks and bring these characters to life in a story arc where all the loose parts are somehow linked.

I had to think about how to start the book, how the story evolves and how to end it (i.e. conflict termination). And it had to be written so that readers with no clue about the structure and organisation of the Malaysian Armed Forces would be able to follow the story easily. At the same time, I had to think about the military nuts who expect some level of detail and realism in fight scenes, while avoiding loading the story with too many technical terms or crossing red lines (re: opsec). 

A tricky balance.

Nearly gave up... 😐

Am grateful to everyone who helped me press on, and who believed in the project long before the manuscript was even finished. In the end, I treated it like one long blog post and wrote a book which I myself would read.

When it was finished, the book had a word count of 70,000 and covered 400 pages. This page count does not include three maps, a Glossary with around 150 terms, a short Author's Note (two pages), a Dedication and the Epigraph with the motto from the Malaysian Army's Briged Artileri Roket.

This book is the longest and most complex piece of writing I have done. It includes a period of tension in the lead up to operations, as well as action that takes place on land, sea, air, cyberspace and in space. The last aspect on earth observation satellites, what they can see and their orbits was something new that I had to learn from European and US satellite tracking otakus (there are websites dedicated to this arcane hobby). 

Feedback from the test readers seems positive. 

Looking at the book, it seems to me that the key character isn't the military personnel or the units they come from. To me, the protagonist is the Malaysian Armed Forces and how it pivots from a period of tension into an unthinkable scenario. The people you will read about from the jenerals to the lain-lain pangkat (enlisted ranks) are, in my view, the supporting cast to the activities and operations executed by the MAF.

I am happy to see it done! Also somewhat nervous but getting more excited as we count down to its launch day.

Here's how it looks compared to Defending the Lion City, which is the book published by my university supervisor 22 years ago in the year 2000.

You may also like these previews:

Royal Malaysian Navy SUBTICS submarine combat management system. Click here

Malaysian Army OTO Melara 105mm pack howitzer. Click here

Malaysian Army Anza and Royal Malaysian Navy Starstreak MANPADS. Click here

Expect more sneak previews of the book (no spoilers) from this blog, kementah.blogspot.com, in the coming days as we count down to the launch.

Days to launch: 12 days (22 November 22). NO PRESALE.