My Thai Novel

2007-09-03T12:04:00.005-07:00

page8

2007-09-03T12:04:00.003-07:00

page7

2007-09-03T12:04:00.001-07:00

page6

2007-09-03T12:03:00.003-07:00

page5

2007-09-03T12:03:00.001-07:00

page4

2007-09-03T12:02:00.003-07:00

page3

2007-09-03T12:02:00.001-07:00

Purchase

2007-09-03T11:58:00.001-07:00

The Story - "From Nowhere to Nee"

2007-09-03T11:57:00.000-07:00

Synopsis
From Nowhere to Nee is a love story... It tells of the innocent and pure love of two teenagers. It is also a story of cultural differences, of a mother's love for her son and her desire to hold her family together, and a father's struggle to do what he feels is right for his son. These are stories of human nature, of the search for who we are, and the pain and pleasure we feel along the way.

David Maxwell is a teenage boy feeling lost between cultures. Born in Australia of a gentle and caring Thai mother, and an Australian father who comes through a battle with alcohol after his wife convinces him the only way to save their marriage is to break free of Australia and return to her native Thailand. Life in Bangkok is not what David had envisaged. As an adolescent growing up in Australia, David had always felt "different", and in Thailand he hoped he may find the feeling of being "home" that he had so often longed for. This didn't prove to be the case. He has very little understanding of the language, and equally inadequate understanding of the culture.

Then David falls in love with Nee, the poor farm girl from western Thailand who through a sad consequence of circumstance and desperation, finds herself working in one of Bangkok's many "go-go bars". As this innocent teen love develops, David and Nee are befriended by a withdrawn and somewhat feral veteran of the Vietnam war. Rilms Henderson is a enigmatic character who having returned to the U.S. after his tours of duty, quickly became disillusioned, and returned to immerse, or perhaps hide, his heart in S.E. Asia.

David's mother, Charnya, is the fabric that holds this family together, and along with Rilms, she clearly sees the smile of love in her son's heart.

David's father Graham proves a very adept businessman in Bangkok. He quickly masters the ways of Thai business and dealing with officials, yet his typically Australian male upbringing makes empathy and heartfelt understanding with his son's life difficult. Real intimacy does not come easy to Graham Maxwell. He vehemently disagrees with David's choice of girlfriend, and the intervention he sees as being necessary and protective of his son's long-term interests, not only causes David much pain, but highlights a lack of cultural awareness that will take Graham some time to overcome.

David's relationship with Rilms becomes one of true friendship - the kind of relationship David could only dream about having with his own father. It is Rilms who sets out to unravel the mystery behind Nee's disappearance from Bangkok, and through his efforts, finally David's father comes to see the pain he has cause his son.

My Life in Thailand

2007-09-03T11:28:00.001-07:00

I arrived in Thailand in early 1995 to work in the chemical industry. My introduction to Thai life began immediately with my business associates accommodating me in a 3 storey shophouse in a small soi (street) opposite the factory. I was 16kms out of Bangkok, in a heavily industrialized area, and by virtue of the stares and attention given me, there had not been too many white faces living in my new neighborhood before...

It was here where I spent my working week and where I had my first experiences in washing from a bucket, listening to the geckos on the walls and ceilings by night, and very quickly acquiring a taste for boiled rice.

I would spend my weekends in Bangkok, staying at a small hotel in Yannawa within walking distance of Silom Road and what I considered the center of the city.

The idea of writing fiction had never occurred to me before, yet on the King’s Birthday, December 5th of 1995, I suddenly had an urge to write. To write what – I had no idea. The strangest things happen at times, and this was one of those times. After a leisurely afternoon shopping for groceries I headed home to the small studio apartment off Rama III Road I had moved into back in June. I sat up that night with unintelligible Thai TV soap operas playing in the background as I contemplated my foray into the world of literature. Nothing. My mind was a complete blank.

That night I had a dream, and in that dream, the characters that would become such an important part of my life emerged. I remember waking and writing down the names Rilms and David. I also remember thinking this was a story about Rilms, the American expatriate Vietnam war vet who now called Thailand home, but later it changed to be a story of love between teenage David and a Thai girl named Nee.

Writing the story took me almost two years and by the time I finished in late 1997, the Asian economies had imploded and no local publisher had any interest in new work. The story of David and Nee has been left on the shelf long enough. It is time to share these wonderful characters with the world...

Since leaving Thailand in December 2000, I have lived in Brisbane, Australia - Phuket, Thailand (through most of 2005) - and now Tulsa, Oklahoma. I am now working on a non-fiction manuscript that is an amusing and informative tale of my first year living and working in Thailand.

Links

2007-09-03T11:27:00.000-07:00

Click on the following to visit some interesting sites...

An Expat in Thailand
A non-fiction story of my first year working and living in Thailand

Bangkok Books
A great source of reading material on Asia