.jpg)
By Mihar Dias August 2026
There are some encounters you simply cannot script.
This one began outside a cookie shop at KLGCC Mall. A man in a red shirt, slippers—or perhaps chapals, my eyesight is no better than my fashion sense—walked in, surveyed the surroundings like a seasoned politician measuring the electoral mood, and settled on a bench.
"That's him," one of us whispered.
Indeed it was.
We invited him over. He joined us, ordered an iced latte, and got straight to the point.
“I'm writing another book.”
Excellent. Malaysia can never have enough politicians writing books explaining why the country would have been perfect had everyone only listened to them.
"So what's the title?" we asked.
"A Small Voice," he replied.
The table fell silent.
Why, we wondered, would anybody buy a book called A Small Voice written by a man who has never been accused of whispering?
The title simply refused to fit the author.
“What is it about?”
“The major issues facing the country.”
That made the title even stranger. If the issues are major, why is the voice small?
We spent the next few minutes behaving like an unpaid publishing committee, throwing titles around with reckless abandon.
Since he now finds himself politically associated with PAS and is reportedly eyeing a difficult constituency, we suggested something suitably biblical.
“The Messiah.”
After all, listening to him describe his hopes for Malaysia, he sounded remarkably like Moses preparing to lead the people into the Promised Land.
"MashaAllah," someone interrupted. “Forget it. PAS would probably drop him before the first print run, while everyone else would accuse him of being a false prophet.”
That title died a quick and merciful death.
The conversation wandered elsewhere.
He spoke candidly about his eyesight. Reading has become difficult unless the print is enlarged to at least size 18.
That inspired another mischievous suggestion.
“In the Kingdom of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man...”
He laughed—but not enough to adopt it.
Fortunately for him.
He challenged us instead.
“Give me a better title within 48 hours.”
A few hours later, inspiration struck. We proposed another title—far stronger than A Small Voice. He liked it considerably more.
For now, however, we'll keep it under wraps until he is ready to unveil it himself.
Then came the inevitable sales pitch.
He asked for our telephone numbers, hoping we might support the book by buying a couple of copies.
A couple?
That may move a hundred books if all your friends are equally charitable. Hardly a publishing strategy.
So we proposed something rather different.
A mechanism that, if executed properly, could sell far more than a few sympathetic copies.
His face lit up.
The iced latte suddenly tasted sweeter.
Whether the idea works is another matter altogether. In Malaysia, brilliant ideas often perish somewhere between enthusiasm and execution.
We'll let you know in the next column whether our accidental publishing consultation produces a bestseller—or merely another small voice struggling to be heard in a country where everyone prefers speaking to listening.
Mihar Dias (mihardias@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
The User Content (as defined on Newswav Terms of Use) above including the views expressed and media (pictures, videos, citations etc) were submitted & posted by the author. Newswav is solely an aggregation platform that hosts the User Content. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact creator@newswav.com.
