Tan Sri Ismail Ismail aims to become Malaysia’s richest man. Like other locals, he hates the Dolobs.
One day, he fires his office tea lady, Lani. In revenge, Lani, with the help of a female shaman, places a curse on him. He suffers a stroke but survives only because he is building a dam in the valley where the shaman lives. She wants him to delay the dam’s construction. The tycoon agrees, but on one condition: she must kill Lani.
To ensure he carries out his promise, the shaman secretly lures his jewelry-obsessed wife and two sons to the valley. Accompanying them are her handsome driver, a stockbroker and his spirit girlfriend.
Last Breath serves alternate history, magic realism and gothic spooks with a healthy dollop of satire.
(Buku Fixi)
(Fixi Novo)
Tunku Halim was born in 1964. He lives nomadically but is a frequent visitor to his country of birth, Malaysia. He relinquished corporate life long before starting this novel which was mostly written on a boat called Ruby M and in ‘Birch Cottage’ in the highlands of Tasmania.
He has his own publishing company and is interested in design and environmentally-friendly urban development. His previous books include the short-story collections The Rape of Martha Teoh & Other Chilling Stories (1997), BloodHaze: 15 Chilling Tales (1999) and The Woman Who Grew Horns and Other Works (2001); the novels Dark Demon Rising (1997) and Vermillion Eye (2000); and the novella Juriah's Song (2008). His non-fiction books include A Children's History of Malaysia (2003) and a biography of his late father Tunku Abdullah — A Passion for Life (1998).
His first book with Fixi Novo was the bestselling mid-career retrospective Horror Stories (2014).