Monsoon Books – förlag

Discover Majapahit, the mighty empire in Southeast Asia that many have never heard of. In the 14th and 15th centuries, the Majapahit kingdom reigned supreme in eastern Java, and its influence stretched far and wide, throughout present-day Indonesia, parts of the Malay peninsula and the island of Tumasek, now Singapore. Majapahit’s army famously repelled Kublai Khan’s invasion, and its formidable navy humbled even the renowned Portuguese mariners. Walk the bustling streets of Majapahit, a melting pot of aristocratic Javanese, shaven-head Brahmins, hermits in bark cloth, widows dressed in white, and Chinese, Persian and Arab traders. Discover beautiful temples and imposing palaces, and markets brimming with goods from all over Asia.At the heart of Majapahit’s story are eccentric kings and queens embroiled in bloody family feuds, and a tipsy court scribe who has the good sense to write down everything he sees. Witness the drama of royal intrigues, murders, revenge and war. This is not just the story of an empire’s rise and fall, it is an exploration of a society rich in religious diversity, social tolerance and artistic achievement, and a society – much like Indonesia today – which must navigate its way in the challenging tapestry of Chinese and Southeast Asian geopolitics.

Long before Majapahit rose to greatness, Srivijaya controlled the sea routes between India and China. Discover Srivijaya, Indonesia’s first maritime empire. Every ship that passed through the Strait of Malacca added to Srivijaya’s wealth, funding magnificent temples, nurturing great centres of Buddhist learning and giving rise to Borobudur, the largest Buddhist monument ever built. Journey through a vibrant world of Chinese monks, Arab sailors, Tamil merchants, pirates, warrior-kings and brilliant princesses. Explore the thriving ports of Sumatra and Kedah, walk the volcanic landscapes of Java and visit the royal courts where diplomacy, marriage and war shaped the destiny of Indonesia. Then witness the dramatic arrival of the mighty Chola empire from southern India, whose devastating naval raids brought Srivijaya’s golden age to an end.Blending meticulous research with vivid storytelling, Herald van der Linde brings to life one of history’s greatest – and least understood – maritime empires.

Bandit Saints of Java is a work of nonfiction that delves deep under the surface of modern Indonesia, exploring personalities and stories in the wacky world of local pilgrimage. It paints an astonishing portrait of Islam as it is practised today - largely invisible to journalists, scholars and tourists - by many of the 130 million people of Java.

Maya, a thirty-something Indonesian caught in the undercurrent of life’s uncertainty, takes a leap of faith from the chaos of Jakarta to a job as a waitress aboard a European cruise ship. There, she meets sexy Kanompang, Oleksii with his European-sized totem, and Maroje, her first love and Croatian prince. In a world where relationships are as transient as the ports she visits, Maya grapples with lies, love and unfulfilled desires. But when her voyage of discovery takes a darker turn in the backstreets of London, where betrayal and misery are a familiar fate for migrant workers, Maya must navigate unscrupulous women, naked men, challenging relationships and the pull of home.Set in cruise ship cabins, East London pubs and West End brothels, this tragicomedy is a tale of survival, a search for identity, and the hope of finding a harbour in life’s stormy sea.

Indonesia's capital city of Jakarta - home to over 10 million people with more than 30 million in its greater metropolitan area - stands as a testament to resilience, reinvention and the enduring spirit of its inhabitants.Inspired by the vibrant mix of people who have settled here over the centuries and by the labyrinthine kampung that crisscross the megacity, Herald van der Linde, bestselling author of Majapahit, explores the history of Jakarta through the eyes of individuals who have walked its streets through the ages, including his own ancestors. Jakarta traces the city's evolution from pre-colonial times to the bustling metropolis it is today, revealing how it has taken shape over 500 years.Compelling reading for Jakartans and visitors alike, this is a celebration of the history and people of Jakarta - a heartfelt tribute from a long-time resident to his adopted home.

Indonesia, 1965. As General Suharto seizes power and the streets of Jakarta run with fear, 14-year-old Tari Budiardjo's life is torn apart. Her Javanese father and British-born mother - intellectuals and civil servants-turned-radicals in Sukarno's government - are imprisoned without trial, leaving her to navigate adolescence in a city of soldiers, informers and whispered betrayals. Between crushes, curfews and secret errands for the resistance, Tari finds herself caught between childhood and revolution. My Neighbour, The Dictator is both an intimate memoir and a rare witness to Indonesia's most turbulent years - a story of family, love and survival in the shadow of tyranny.

Soeraja is dying and calls for Jeng Yah, a woman who is not his wife, shocking his three sons — Lebas, Karim and Tegar — heirs to Kretek Djagad Raja, Indonesia’s largest clove cigarette empire. Their mother is consumed by jealousy as the brothers embark on a quest to find Jeng Yah and uncover the truth about their family business and its secrets.Cigarette Girl is more than a love story and the soul-searching journey of three brothers. Set on the island of Java, the story follows the evolution of a family’s kretek, or clove cigarette, business, introducing readers to three generations of Indonesia’s history through cloves and unrequited love.

Not many British schoolgirls have grown up to become revolutionary heroes of distant, eastern nations but Muriel Stewart Walker did just that. Under a multitude of different names - 'K'tut Tantri' and 'Surabaya Sue' being the best know - she joined in the struggle for Indonesian independence after the Second World War and broadcast its revolutionary message to the world on Rebel Radio. But she did more and smuggled arms, and probably drugs, to help finance the new Republic and experienced bloody battle in the British attack on Surabaya that some have seen as a war crime. She went on to become an intimate of the revolutionary leaders and finally lived to see Indonesia take its place amongst the free nations of the world. Glaswegian 'Surabaya Sue' is virtually unknown in the West and, even in Indonesia, there have always been doubts about her version of events that many have dismissed outright as a blatant mixture of outrageous fantasy and dishonest omissions. Snow over Surabaya happily embraces those doubts and brings a new, spirited account of her adventures in that tempestuous world.

Nona Baker stayed behind in the Malayan jungle during WWII and was adopted by Chinese guerrillas. Against all odds, this remarkable, brave young woman, known as Pai Naa (White Nona), remained in the jungle for three years, avoiding capture by the Japanese and betrayal by spies.

'The Man Who Wore His Wife’s Sarong', Suchen Christine Lim’s short stories of the unsung, unsaid and uncelebrated in Singapore, delve beneath the sunlit island’s prosperity and coded decorum. Her characters chip away prejudice and sculpt it into acceptance of the other.

Through a collection of letters written to his best friend and to his father in England, and from his own personal diary entries, John Dodds memoir offers a fascinating, and amusing, glimpse of life as a colonial rubber planter. With true stories and confessions that would make even Somerset Maugham blush.

Thomas Hodges of the East India Company seizes a chance at glory by being the first to venture ashore at the pepper port of Banten in Java, Indonesia, in 1608. Would he unlock the mysterious riches of Java for the English, or die forgotten with a Javanese kris or Portuguese poignard between his ribs?

Skinny Chinese taxi-girls dance with off-duty British military personnel at the Yam Yam nightclub to the strains of 'Rose, Rose, I love you' and 'Terang Bulan'. Attractively dressed in their long, tight-fitting, slit-sided cheongsams, the girls also listen out for loose talk, which they feed back to their Communist handlers. It is 1950s Malaya and the country is in the throes of the Malayan Emergency. As the British do battle with Communist terrorists hiding deep in the jungle, one British officer, a Communist sympathizer, has come to the attention of the staff at the Yam Yam. When Alan Hinlea, a British Gurkha captain with a hatred of a class system that has always kept him down, deserts to the guerillas and is spirited away to the jungle Communist HQ, Chin Peng, the leader of the Malayan Communist Party gloats at what he hopes will be a major propaganda victory. A fellow British Gurkha officer is despatched with five Gurkhas to hunt Hinlea down and the chase through pathless jungle becomes a race against time and a contest of deadly jungle warfare skills. Operation Janus is the first in a trilogy of books involving Gurkha military units that may be read in any order and is followed by Operation Blind Spot and Operation Four Rings. The author, JP Cross, a retired Gurkha colonel, old 'jungle hand' and counter-insurgency expert, draws on real events he witnessed during his time fighting in the Malayan Emergency and on true characters, including a British officer of his own battalion who attempted to join the Communist terrorists.

Tracing the development of Singapore in the years 1836-1854, against the background of the First Opium War and the Taiping Rebellion, Chasing the Dragon (Singapore Saga, Vol. 2) continues to vividly portray the lives of the early pioneers of the expanding port city.

Hungry Ghosts is the volume three in the Singapore Saga, a series of historical fiction covering the early years of Singapore, and follows Forbidden Hill and Chasing the Dragon.

It is 1950. Singapore and the worst riots the island has ever seen have shut down the town for days, killing 18 people and wounding 173. Racial and religious tension has been simmering for months over the custody battle for wartime waif Maria Hertogh between her Malay Muslim foster mother and her Dutch-Catholic biological parents. Eurasian Annie Collins, following the Maria Hertogh case and filled with hope, returns to Singapore seeking her own lost baby Maria. As the time bomb ticks and Annie unravels the threads of her quest into increasingly dangerous territory, she finds strange recollections intruding...

Twilight in Kuta explores love, loss and infidelity in present-day Indonesia from a number of perspectives, their stories intertwine throughout the book, and the various narrators offer different interpretations of the events that unfold.

Circumstance is the first in a trilogy of W. Somerset Maugham-inspired colonial tales set in 1920s Malaya.

Historical military novel set in Malaysia and Thailand in the 1950s and centred on the British Gurkha regiments that fought in the Malayan Emergency and the Indonesian Confrontation. Standalone sequel to Operation Janus.

A Yellow House explores the plight of migrant domestic workers in Singapore and the relationships with their employers and their young charges.

In Iban Woman, volume 3 of the Iban Dream series, the traditional folklore and lifestyle of the Ibans of Sarawak provide the inspiration for this fantasy fiction. Life has changed for many modern Iban women in Borneo, but the aspiration to be a traditional perfect woman is still considered noble.

Forgotten in Thailand's troubled Deep South, on the border of Muslim Malaysia, stands a dilapidated wooden palace once home to a Malay ruler, the last of his dynasty.

In George Town, the capital of Penang, the Pearl of the Orient and a Malaysian island hugely popular with domestic and international tourists, trishaws ply between colonial buildings as they ferry tourists to sightsee. The more lustful combine sightseeing with sex, sometimes with unexpected results.

In this ecological parable, author John Waromi, a member of the Ambai tribe, sheds light on not only the ecology of the southern Papuan coast but also the struggle of the indigenous Papuan people to survive the environmental destruction that is inflicted upon them.

After the ceasefire in Laos in February 1973, London forbids Colonel Jason Rance, the British Defence Attaché in Laos, from continuing his search for four Lao ‘moles’, who work within the Communist Party and wear a dedicated ring as a talisman.

Behind every bargirl's smile and every foreigner's beer glass lurks a story: happy, touching, heart-wrenching. The author interviews bargirls, mamasans and customers, who reveal true stories of sex scams, doomed relationships and tragic suicides in Pattaya, Thailand.