While it is a little disappointing that the stories aren’t scary enough to make your heart beat faster or fear looking behind you, what makes these particularly strong narratives is how Oui’s writing is quintessentially relatable. Those who love a twist ending are also in for a treat by the time they reach the end of this novel, with a rather satisfactory surprise as to the fate of the storytellers. Standouts from the collection include the incredibly sad ‘Jaga Jaga’, where a young student is saved by the ghost of a janitor haunting the school the uplifting ‘Curse of the Papaya Tree’, where a tussle over a hefty inheritance leads to an arboreal enchantment as well as ‘The Confessions of a Gambling Man’, where a little greed and spirit summoning gives some gamblers a lot more than they bargained for. Taking place across various timelines, most of the stories are characterised by undeserved violence towards innocents, unresolved guilt and grudges that cause spirits to remain earthbound, or outrightly a source of fascination with the sheer number of monsters that are introduced, more often human than paranormal. And as much as it markets itself as ‘tales of terror’, what makes these stories stick in your head is the emotional grip they tend to have.
Using the framing narrative of a group of boys exchanging spooky, supernatural tales around a campfire in the dark of night, Taiping Tales of Terror acts as the perfect primer for anyone wanting to get acquainted with Malaysia’s most famous ghosts and monsters.Įach story in the collection is self-contained, making this book worthwhile to hold onto for revisiting your favourite story as and when you want.
Rather ironically, ‘Taiping’ literally translates to ‘peaceful’, while the stories contained within this collection are anything but. While we may not have grown up in an environment where campfire ghost stories were the norm, Malaysian author Julya Oui certainly takes us right to that setting with her short story collection Taiping Tales of Terror. The ghosts and legends of Southeast Asia come to life when a group of boys share campfire tales.
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