THE UNFINISHED BOOK OF JOHN began with an email from a total stranger named John Chin – a former Malaysian (and Christian fundamentalist) residing in Sydney. He was given my contact by a mutual friend who had lent him a copy of my book (ADOI!, published 1989 by Times Books International). John explained that he had written and self-published his first book, Confessions of a Christian Fundamentalist – but it hadn’t been well received by his friends and family. He admitted that he was really keen to get published, even if it meant publishing his own work. John said he was coming to Malaysia in a few weeks and would like very much to meet me. He wanted my postal address so he could send me a copy of Confessions.
When John Chin showed up at my doorstep sometime in 2004 I had already skimmed through his book. While his writing lacked finesse, I found the subject matter intriguing enough. Religious fundamentalism is among the most divisive problems confronting humanity. John had written a personal account of his own journey from belief to unbelief. He had evolved from an unquestioning acceptance of the basic tenets of his faith to a more open-minded quest for metaphysical and spiritual knowledge. I had myself spent decades deconstructing belief systems by researching the roots of religious indoctrination and had come to certain inevitable conclusions of my own.
Essentially, John felt he had been ripped off by a professional editor in Australia whom he had paid handsomely to polish up his syntax and he believed I could do a far better job. He named me a figure and it took me only a few minutes to accept his offer (I was pretty broke at the time). Within hours he had banked a cash advance into my account, assuring me that further payments would be prompt and that if the book sold well he would throw in a royalty on top of that.
When I began working in earnest on John Chin’s manuscript, it quickly dawned on me that this wasn’t going to be a straightforward editing project. A large proportion of the material was merely a summary of several historical treatises on the early Church – it was ponderous reading and, quite frankly, banal. I wrote to John, proposing a complete overhaul of his book rather than a cosmetic edit. He wanted to see a few chapters, so I worked on the opening and closing chapters of the book and emailed those to him. The response was immediate and enthusiastic. John gave me the green light to do whatever I saw fit with his manuscript.
"Don’t worry about a deadline," John generously quipped, "I know genius can’t be hurried!" I took him at his word and the project dragged on for more than a year, mainly because of various distractions (like the acquisition of a digital videocamera, editing software, and a new laptop). Finally, almost two years after John Chin’s first visit, I had nine chapters done. The book was now entirely different from the original manuscript, apart from a few bits of biographical information. Indeed, it was much more me than him – and I suggested he send me a little more material on his personal evolution as a spiritual pilgrim Down Under, so I could include more of the John Chin element in the final mix.
Months passed and I didn’t hear from John. Finally he wrote me a gloomy email cataloguing his recent trials and tribulations. His family had thrown him out; and soon after that he had been diagnosed with a heart condition which required bypass surgery. He was slowly recuperating but could no longer work as intensely as he used to, which meant his income was greatly reduced. After paying his medical bills and child support, John Chin no longer felt he could afford to play capitalist publisher – not even for his own books.
It was sad to see John in this sorry state. He had been a perfect gentleman in his dealings with me but I could understand why his wife and kids found him such a difficult housemate. I asked John if he would like to me to find a publisher for the revamped manuscript and he pessimistically said, "Go ahead and try but I doubt anyone will want to publish it." After sending the manuscript to a couple of local publishers and getting no response, I began to feel that John may have been correct about the unpublishability of our collaborative effort.
Meanwhile, an earlier manuscript of mine (Tanah Tujuh: Close Encounters with the Temuan Mythos) had just been published by Silverfish Books and I was getting invitations to read at literary gatherings. At one of these I read a chapter from The Unfinished Book of John and was happy to see it so warmly received. People approached me afterwards and asked when the book would be out. If only readers and publishers shared the same taste in books!
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