Writing Against Expectations

People find it quite pleasing to read a novel set in London by a young British writer that takes all kinds of experimental risks ... But if you do that in a Malaysian novel, then all of a sudden you're going to raise eyebrows. I think the Western reading public has decided over the years what it's going to expect from various parts of the world. As a novelist from Southeast Asia, you have to work that much harder to convince people of your way of doing things.

Tash Aw is interviewed by Kevin Rabalais in The Australian about his latest novel Map of the Invisible World.