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misspalah's review
5.0
My oh My! How do i start with this review? I love all the stories in this book. This is not an exaggeration. Every single story is so distinctive but at the same time retain the essence of feminism. The book are divided into 2 parts which are stories from long time ago and contemporary stories. In fact, i was surprised that i enjoyed the contemporary stories part more than the other part in the book. For the majority of the stories in this particular part, it consisted of the reimagining characters from old folklore and history that has been adapted to the current time. Furthermore, these authors managed to add layers of social commentary in these stories in a brilliant manner. It was about adventure, pain, passion, revenge and losses embedded in each tale. It was waiting to be uncovered by the readers when they picked up this book. While i love all the stories in this book, there are few that stands out from the rest.
Part 1 : stories from long ago
1) Red and White by Preeta Samarasan
Perhaps, you have read, watch and listen to 'Bawang Merah and Bawang Putih' million times. Try to read it again but this time in the perspective of the so called 'bad girl'.
2) The Veiled Knight by Hezreen Abdul Rashid
The first female warrior in Islam's history.
3) The girl on the mountain by Leela Chakrabarty
It takes a strong girl to defy the king and say what's exactly on her mind. While she is beautiful but she doesn't let anyone takes her for a fool.
Part 2 : Contemporary Stories
1) Surya and the supernatural sleuths by Julya oui
A kind hearted girl with a third eye vision tried to search a missing girl in her town. She got helped from supernatural beings that lived around her.
2) Gamble by Sharmilla Ganesan
The adaptation of draupadi in the modern setting.
3) Grey by Shireen Zainuddin
The journey of 2 best friends searching for 'Mahsuri' and rediscovering themselves while on the journey.
4) Unduk Ngadau by Julie Padasian
The strong bond between grandmother and grand daughters shared through the Huminodun and Unduk Ngadau.
5) Under the bridge by Golda Mowe
Is it a real crocodile? Is it only myth? Is it just a shred of imagination?
The fact that this book was so malaysian (if there's even such term) is just another plus points. I was surprised to check that the book got low rating in Goodreads. I would suggest everyone to browse gerakbudaya website and buy this book. After you have read it, please pass it to your daughters, nieces, females students whomever you feel that need to read this book. To gerakbudaya, if there's a possibility of translating this to Bahasa Malaysia, do publish it.
Part 1 : stories from long ago
1) Red and White by Preeta Samarasan
Perhaps, you have read, watch and listen to 'Bawang Merah and Bawang Putih' million times. Try to read it again but this time in the perspective of the so called 'bad girl'.
2) The Veiled Knight by Hezreen Abdul Rashid
The first female warrior in Islam's history.
3) The girl on the mountain by Leela Chakrabarty
It takes a strong girl to defy the king and say what's exactly on her mind. While she is beautiful but she doesn't let anyone takes her for a fool.
Part 2 : Contemporary Stories
1) Surya and the supernatural sleuths by Julya oui
A kind hearted girl with a third eye vision tried to search a missing girl in her town. She got helped from supernatural beings that lived around her.
2) Gamble by Sharmilla Ganesan
The adaptation of draupadi in the modern setting.
3) Grey by Shireen Zainuddin
The journey of 2 best friends searching for 'Mahsuri' and rediscovering themselves while on the journey.
4) Unduk Ngadau by Julie Padasian
The strong bond between grandmother and grand daughters shared through the Huminodun and Unduk Ngadau.
5) Under the bridge by Golda Mowe
Is it a real crocodile? Is it only myth? Is it just a shred of imagination?
The fact that this book was so malaysian (if there's even such term) is just another plus points. I was surprised to check that the book got low rating in Goodreads. I would suggest everyone to browse gerakbudaya website and buy this book. After you have read it, please pass it to your daughters, nieces, females students whomever you feel that need to read this book. To gerakbudaya, if there's a possibility of translating this to Bahasa Malaysia, do publish it.
athirah_idrus's review
adventurous
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
3.5
This book is a collection of 18 stories; 8 retellings of folklores and 10 contemporary stories centering female characters.
The book was a project undertaken after the two editors identified the gap in the market for books with women as the main characters, particularly in Malaysian and Southeast Asian tales and folklores.
The book featured retellings of famous legendary figures like Puteri Gunung Ledang and Hang Li Po, from angles we've never heard before. The standout for me was Red and White by Preeta Samaresan. It was a refreshing and hilarious take on Bawang Merah and Bawang Putih! I was chuckling all through the short 10 pages or so. If you could spare some time to read only one tale from this book, I'd pick this one.
Though I applaud the initiative to bring together all the heroines under one banner, the selection was a bit underwhelming in my opinion. Some of the stories were more of just stories with central female characters, but unfortunately fell short in terms of impact to engage the readers. While they could probably stand on their own as short stories, when compiled under 'feminist tales', perhaps I expected more emphasis on women empowerment.
However, hopefully with the publication of this book, it'd signal that there's a market for feminist tales for our kids. I hope there'd be more books like this in future, putting the spotlight on our legendary women figures, as much as we have on our men.
The book was a project undertaken after the two editors identified the gap in the market for books with women as the main characters, particularly in Malaysian and Southeast Asian tales and folklores.
The book featured retellings of famous legendary figures like Puteri Gunung Ledang and Hang Li Po, from angles we've never heard before. The standout for me was Red and White by Preeta Samaresan. It was a refreshing and hilarious take on Bawang Merah and Bawang Putih! I was chuckling all through the short 10 pages or so. If you could spare some time to read only one tale from this book, I'd pick this one.
Though I applaud the initiative to bring together all the heroines under one banner, the selection was a bit underwhelming in my opinion. Some of the stories were more of just stories with central female characters, but unfortunately fell short in terms of impact to engage the readers. While they could probably stand on their own as short stories, when compiled under 'feminist tales', perhaps I expected more emphasis on women empowerment.
However, hopefully with the publication of this book, it'd signal that there's a market for feminist tales for our kids. I hope there'd be more books like this in future, putting the spotlight on our legendary women figures, as much as we have on our men.
candiemarsh's review
5.0
Enjoyed this immensely! All stories were well-written and very entertaining. I enjoyed all of them, but my fave has got to be Preeta Samarasan's interesting take on a famous duo in "Red and White". This is a good read, specifically for young adults regardless of gender and background. To be fair, even myself being in mid-30s, I learned a lot of new things through these stories. Kudos to this amazing collection!
hvr1th's review
3.0
The Principal Girl sets its setting mainly in SEA. Something that I find fascinating. Writers from different ethnicities, different cultures, and different skin colours. But they all share two things in common; a gender, and a nationality. I truly enjoyed the 2nd story written by Preeta Samarasan. Totally remarkable. Apart from that, Gamble by Sharmilla Ganesan had also found its way into my heart. Absolutely heartfelt.
daphnelee's review
3.0
Having curated and edited two collections of Malaysian short stories, I am aware that it's not an easy task to produce a book in which the stories are of a consistent quality. Unfortunately, we do not (as yet) have a large enough pool of experienced and talented writers to produce enough well-written stories (especially in English) to fill an anthology. Still, this shouldn't deter anyone from planning to collect and publish short stories by local writers. However, it should be stressed that such endeavours take time and patience to complete, and may leave those in the editing/publishing roles with their sanity in shreds. Nevertheless, I learnt a lot from editing the anthologies Malaysian Tales: Retold & Remixed and Remang and both experiences were ultimately rewarding and enriching. I hope this was also the case for Sharifah Aisha Osman and Tuty Dutta, the editors of The Principal Girl.
I really like a few of the stories in this collection. The Girl on the Mountain and Red and White by Preeta Samarasan are excellent, the kind of stories that send shivers up your spine, that excite you and make you want to write.
And I love Julya Ooi's Surya and the Supernatural Sleuths — in particular the voice of its protagonist and the tale's original take on Malaysia's most 'beloved' ghoul, the Pontianak; and Anna Tan’s delightful Operation: Rescue Pris (with its even more delightful gedembai).
I also enjoyed Golda Mowe's Under the Bridge, although I'm not certain what is 'feminist' about the story. In fact, this is not the only story which makes me to wonder if the collection's sub-title — Feminist Tales from Asia — is a suitable one. In my opinion, the title The Principal Girl would have been sufficient to convey the idea of stories that centre female protagonists, without actually championing feminism. As it is, the 'feminist' label is problematic as the definition of this word is not reflected in quite a few of the tales.
I would go so far as to say that some of the stories here are anti-feminist, in various ways. One example is Renie Ling's Saving Grace. Although it has an ostensibly highly-principled protagonist who strives to save the shrine of a goddess and be true to the promises she made to her late grandmother, she also betrays worryingly ageist and sizeist attitudes towards a stepmother who is stereotypically, conveniently and predictably unpleasant. All these points wouldn’t necessarily be at odds in a feminist story if the writing was more nuanced, and the issues more thoroughly explored. Unfortunately, that’s just not the case here.
This and other pieces in the collection would definitely have benefited from more rigorous editing. Sumitra Selvaraj’s The Queen’s Last Stand seems unfinished; Reborn by Joyce Ch’ng and Priya’s Faraway Tree’ by Krishnaveni Panikker are messily constructed to the point of being nonsensical and pointless; retellings like Cik Siti Wan Kemboja and Princess of Mount Ledang do little to add to the tales as we already know them; while Shireen Zainudin’s Grey and Sharmilla Ganesan’s Gamble could do with the authors delving more into what makes their characters tick and developing their storylines further. Grey is, I feel, especially vague. The author needs to decide what the story is about, or maybe I’ve just missed her point.
However, I do know that it is far from easy to work with more than a dozen authors and have to deal with different temperaments and styles of writing. The writers’ intentions and attitudes are also to be considered, and their willingness and ability to put in the work are factors that are rarely discussed in this industry. On occasion, short of rewriting work themselves, there’s not a lot that editors can do to improve stories.
There really is more to anthologies, especially local ones, than meets the eye, but I like the idea behind the creation of The Principal Girl and I hope it is just the first in a series that puts female characters front and centre.
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