The Highwayman

Rating:	★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Science Fiction & Fantasy
Author:	R. A. Salvatore

Hokay, I'm already familiar with Salvatore's world of Corona, having read the first couple of Demonwars books.

There, the Abelle Church, powered with magic from gemstones, dominated the realm of Honce, complete with Inquisitors etc., corrupt clergy and heavy abuse of power.

In this prequel series, the church was still in its early years, competing against an older religion, Shamhainism, but already demonstrating dogmatism, inflexibility and hypocrisy.

But that was not primary significance of the novel.

The premise of the novel was that an honestly devoute Abelle preacher went far south to the country of Bhest, where his people thought people lived like beasts.

Instead, Bran Dynard found a reclusive group of mystics living high in the mountains above cloud levels, who woved the spirituality they practice into their lives, into their exotic martial arts, complete with "chi" exercises.

Bran also found Sen Wi, a wife and a Jhest Tu martial artist.
His perspectives much broadened, Bran believed insights from the Jhest Tu would help his Church and painstakingly copied the sacred text of the Jhest Tu in their original language, with their blessings.

He expected resistance, but he had not imagined how much. He and his wife lost their lives in the process, leaving behind a crippled infant. His old friend Garibond was entrusted with the child and the Jhest Tu scripture. Taught by Sen Wi in a short period before she died after labour, Garibond taught the boy Bransen who grew up like "Forrest Gump" physically, the difference being the boy had a keen mind.

That the boy grew up to be the "Highwayman", robbing the rich to help the poor, a la swashbuckling Robin Hood and Zorro, complete with witty verbal repartee a la Spider-man, was not surprising. That is the expected staple, if one does not already get the hint from the cover of the book.

What made me want to throw the book down was that the boy overcame his deformities and slurring speech, all in secret, through the power of a magic gemstone and Jhest Tu mental and physical exercises which he learned from memorising the book (the book was later destroyed), and got his "chi" straightened out.

And last groan came because without guidance and prior sparring experience, he became an expert martial artists, taking on multiple inexperienced opponents the first time round, veteran soldiers and their seasoned commander the subsequent rounds.

*puke* *puke *puke*

I mean, these kind of stuff may be fine a few decades ago ... in Chinese wuxia novels and movies ... where the hero can become champion combatant just by reading manuals and practising alone.

Today ... it went beyond stretching the credibility and straight down into B-movie flicks ... or maybe C-movie.

Okay, Neo did it too in Matrix, but the audience was willing to let it go because the special effects were cool enough and they were more intrigued by the whole question of existentialism versus reality thingy.

But I cannot overlook this type of thing from an author like Salvatore who had turned out far better writings in the past.

Insiders, Lady S

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Comics & Graphic Novels
Author:	Several

A real treat for nostalia buffs like me.

It was many years ago I left Indonesia as a young boy. Even then, there was a proliferation of European comics such as those from Don Lawrence, primarily translated from their Dutch versions.

Unlike British or American comics at the time, European comics have a very wide genre, including those aimed at children like Tintin, and those at more mature youths and adults (and no, I'm not talking about porns).

It was very disappointing when I found in Singapore very few such comics available. The only kind that's found are mainly kidstuff like those by Herge, Gosciny and Uderzo.

Thankfully, a few years ago, Cinebook began republishing many of these titles, and even introduced new ones too.

Not having money to burn, I tried to recommend them to NLB a couple of years back, only to be informed the themes were unsuitable.

Fortunately, in recent months, some of the titles were reviewed and a couple of them have found their way to the shelves.

Lady S and Insiders brought me back to the European comics style I used to read as a kid, even though they are recent products and set in 21st century.

The artists used an even more realistic style of drawing, along with improved shading techniques. Can't say I'm an expert, but it might just be that they are still using manual drawing and colouring rather than using computers like what American comic artists are using.

Now, if only they bring in the rest just as fast.

Burning of scriptures ...

No, I'm not about to do it, but nor am I adamantly opposed to it either ...

No, I'm not against other religions or any religion in particular.

Knowing how throughout history and modern times, religious extremists have been using the scriptures to enslave, to kill, to steal, to teat families apart, I can well empathise with the strong emotions that drove people to publicly burn scriptures, be it the Quran, or the Bible, or something else.

Even in Singapore, such extremism or misled passions caused a family to alienate my friend for her sexual orientation. On a national level, it led a group of females to attempt a takeover of a secular social organisation for women.

I don't think of it as declaring war against the religion as much as the abuse of the religion at the hands of these extremists.

The *real* essence of the religious scriptures is not in the physical books but in their message. So to me, burning the physical copies of the scriptures do not inflict any damage against the scriptures nor their message, but it is a strike against the extremists who are unable to make such distinctions - the people who see the written words but not the message which they distort and use to justify acting cruelly against other human beings.

It is one of the ironies to me that in USA what is happening now.

One can burn the national flag to protest against the excesses or abuses of the government without being held as a traitor or the intent being misread.

One can burn the bible to make similar protest.

But when it comes to the Quran, the uproar smacks of nothing less than double standards.

The message from the uproar is that sensibilities of those who hold the national flag sacred and the sensibilities of those who hold the Bible sacred can be trampled upon - their tolerance taken for granted, but not those of the Muslims.

I'd still defend the scriptures I believe in, despite its abuse by others. I believe that a spring does not provide fresh water and salt water at the same time. So the misuse does not detract from the worth and value of the scriptures. Neither does burning of its physical copies lessen the message in any way.

So, by all means burn the books if you want to make a protest against how the scripture has been used, or rather, misused or abused.

As long as you're not calling to burn people.

The moment an ideology, a religious belief or scripture is made public, you got to be prepared for it to be scrutinised, questioned, criticised, challenged and even to be re-interpreted or distorted from what you thought it should mean.

The human mind is not a computer to receive unquestioningly programming by scriptures, though some people do act like that.

But in Singapore, it'd never be allowed.

Religious Harmony Act is here, not just to prevent unwanted proselytising, but also the egos and sensibilities of many religious people are too fragile to withstand frank criticisms of their scriptures or questioning of how the scriptures are interpreted.

Recently, the government asked the local Malays to be accepting of the non-Malay Muslim foreign arrivals.

When will there be the courage to ask them to be accepting of non-Muslim Malays ...

I don't image that Terry Jones quite share my perspective on scripture burning, but I don't see any arguments presented against him by public figures as being really valid either.

Maybe it's true that it'd endanger American troops and citizens world-wide. But if that is so, then not going ahead is a tacit admission that the Muslims got to be molly-coddled.