Some Thoughts with ... Jared Poon
The Author/s
Jared Poon
Hi! I’m Jared. I write urban fantasy about secret places, families chosen and unchosen, and workplace shenanigans, all set in Southeast Asia.
I’m the author of City of Others, out now. It stars Benjamin Toh, a civil servant who has to deal with an elderly father, a new boyfriend, and a team of bickering misfits, all while trying to manage the supernatural inhabitants of Singapore.
Totally not a real thing, I promise.
By training, I’m a philosopher—my Ph.D. focused on moral psychology and how ethical norms are shaped and transmitted. In my day job, I work with governments across the world on foresight, strategy, and public engagement. That part of my life is called Counter-Fictional, because sometimes the stories we don’t tell are the most powerful.
I also work with Team Project Lunch, a small indie game development studio. We have a demo of our new game out—wishlist us on Steam!
You can usually find me running workshops, playing games (not with your heart—never that), and chasing my two cats around.
Maddy Belton, from the Madeleine Milburn Literary Agency, is my literary agent and partner-in-crime. Please reach out to her with any questions I’m not smart enough to answer.
The Interview
1.- Could you introduce yourself to Jamreads’ readers?
Hi everyone! I’m Jared, the author of City of Others (Orbit US/UK), an urban fantasy set in Singapore about bureaucrats who have to deal with the magical side of the city. By day, I’m an educator and a consultant. By night, I’m a reader, gamer, and cat-dad.
2.- When did you start writing with publication in mind?
This was back in 2022, when I’d just left the Singapore public service to start my own company. A few months into the chaos, I realised I needed a bigger quest to structure my days, and what better quest than learning how to write a novel?
It took me about six months to figure out how to get started (it involved reading a lot of craft books and watching a lot of craft videos), and then a year to birth that first draft.
So painful, so rewarding.
3.- How did the first idea for City of Others appear?
Urban fantasy is my first love, and so it was clear from the start I wanted to write something in that genre.
Setting it in Singapore was a natural next step, since that’s where I grew up (and now live). Having the protagonist as a civil servant in the Singapore government was also a natural step, because I’d spent so much of my career in there, and held all the affection and frustration you’d expect from such a journey.
And thus, this book became a bit of a love letter to my country, my (ex-) colleagues, the folklore and stories I was told as a child. A love letter, and a poke, I suppose.
4.- What made you choose Singapore as the setting for your DEUS files series?
The main part of it was that I’d grown up here, so it felt like the right step. It was also a bit of a missing piece, I felt, in the urban fantasy landscape. We get a lot of stories set in American and European cities, with the unique and fascinating mish-mash of (usually) American or European folklore and heroes and tropes. I just wanted to write something to share with readers the equally rich magic and monsters from Southeast Asia.
5.- Benjamin Toh is a peculiar character. How did he evolve from your first idea/draft to the version the readers finally knew?
My earliest notes for Ben say something like “overworked, smart, can’t let go,” which I think describes a lot of my ex-colleagues. He’s stayed pretty true to that as the core of his character, I’d like to think.
6.- As a writer from ESEA, do you feel have you had any particular difficulties to be published?
This is one of those things where the difficulty is also the strength, I feel. The fact that Southeast Asian folklore and history is less familiar to the global audience does limit the mainstream appeal a little bit, but the unfamiliarity is also precisely what makes it compelling for a particular type of reader.
Our flaws are also what make us unique, just like in life, right?
7.- Which media would you say it has influenced City of Others?
Some of the greats in the genre who really shaped my childhood and young adulthood were luminaries like Jim Butcher (The Dresden Files), Charles Stross (The Laundry Files), and Ben Aaronovitch (Rivers of London). In many ways, I’m just following in their footsteps and standing on the shoulders of these giants, though that would imply that their footsteps were leading up to their own shoulders and that’s very weird.
I also really do love tabletop RPGs, and one of my favorites is White Wolf’s World of Darkness. I’ve played those games with different groups of friends since I was in college, and you better believe that some of the events and settings in the book were inspired by characters from my games!
8.- What can we expect from Jared Poon in the future?
Books Two and Three of The DEUS Files are on the way! Expect Ben and the crew to deal with more monsters, more politics, more bureaucracy, more bad bosses. Maybe Ben’s magic gets weirder? Maybe we find out more about Ben’s family? Maybe he and Adam figure something out about their relationship? Who could even tell?
(I could, but I won’t.)