Group Book Launch - New Titles for January 2016

Approximately 40 people attended the Oyez!Books group book launch held on 27th January at our favourite bookstore, Silverfish, on the second floor of Bangsar Vilage II. The press was supportive and we welcomed reporters and cameramen from Berita Harian and The Star.

Oyez!Books Chairman, Mr Peter Duke introduced the new books for January 2016:

• Menagerie -  fun with the strange names that groups of animals are called in English, written and illustrated by Lim Lay Koon. 
• The Case of the Football Champion, by Heidi Shamsuddin, the third in her series about three children who use a secret door to go back in time to sort out mysteries. The black and white illustrations are by Lim Lay Koon.
• Three colouring books by Susanna Goho-Quek, Underwater World, Teddy Bear Tales and Happy Days that will be attractive to all ages.

• Two picture books about an owl family by Mohd Khairul Azman Ismail, Where is Owly? and My Owl Family Tree. This book won the second prize in the YGL-Oyez! Picture Book Competition, 2015.
• Two books by Emila Yusof; the first, a colouring book based on her very popular Legendary Princesses of Malaysia and the second Fleeting Moments, her own illustrated Haiku poems.

• Three books by Yusof Gajah consisting of two small books for the very young, My Red Pencil and My Haircut and a big book edition of The Real Elephant. The original book was published in Malay by Dewan Bahasa and won the 1996 Noma Concours Grand Prize in Japan. Oyez Books published the English version which proved to be very popular. This is the first ever big picture book by Oyez  aimed at teachers, storytellers, mums and dads who sit down and read to two or three children at a time. A young woman in the audience who used to be a teacher commeneted that it is an deal size for use by kindergarten teachers. 
• Finally, we have Health, Wealth and Happiness illustrated by Chooi Keong. This is an accordion book with illustrations of auspicious symbols in the Chinese culture and a brief explanation with the name of the items in Chinese script.
  

Three of the books were in preview format, meaning they have not gone into mass production. We will be having more preview sessions in the future where we will invite the press and our buyers. The preview sessions will help us obtain feedback from the audience and to decide on the print run. 

​"In a rapidly developing market, such as children’s books in Malaysia,  Oyez books cannot stand still. We have to keep pushing the boundaries," said Mr Duke.

Heidi Shamsuddin introducing her new book

Susanna Goho-Quek in action

Yusof Gajah with the award winning The Real Elephant

Oyez! authors from left to right - Yusof Gajah, Emila Yusof, Lim Lay Koon, Heidi Shamsuddin, Susanna Goho-Quek, Mohd Khairul Azman Ismail

We thank and congratulate our authors for their wonderful work and encourage them to keep on excelling and to aim for world class work. Oyez!Books will continue to support them and aims to bring their books to the international stage.