Malayan Spy

BELONGING, ESPIONAGE, AND BETRAYAL. In modern Kuala Lumpur, a brief encounter with a long-forgotten perfume sends Hamid staggering back to the memory of his youth in London’s Great Smog of 1952, to a Malaya on the cusp of independence and to the terror of being chased by Soviet tanks in an epic uprising in Cold War East Berlin. Hoping to be saved by the fading Empire his father has served, Hamid must rely on his own wits (never a good idea) to be useful to a ruthless Soviet Colonel and his enigmatic mistress. How does one even end up in such a situation? Well, it started with a disastrous Christmas in the English countryside and three competitive friends. Join Hamid as he quests for a home he can never find, for nice things, for love and for identity. Comic and thrilling, this post-colonial novel sets the end of Empire in a global context with the unwitting Hamid at the centre; educated in the tastes of a bygone era, searching for the one who might make him whole.

Kam Raslan is a Malaysian writer and broadcaster. Originally a filmmaker working in London, Los Angeles, Malaysia, and Indonesia, he has written for many publications including the Economist, Mekong Review, and he had a long-running column in the The Edge Malaysia. He hosts two shows on BFM Radio: A Bit of Culture and Just For Kicks. Kam Raslan is the author of Confessions of an Old Boy, a collection of short stories, the various adventures of Dato? Hamid from the 1940s to the 2000s. The book was first published in 2008 and has been re-printed in 2024.