Balli Kaur Jawal’s Now You See Us is loosely inspired by the execution of Flor Contemplacion, a Filipino domestic worker who was accused of murdering a child in Singapore. Jawal remind us that the novel is “not a retelling of those specific events” but inspired by her experience of “traversing places and their truths”.

This is a clever social-political whodunnit, and an enlightening reading experience for those who, like me, have little knowledge of Singapore outside what tourists are allowed to see. Here, I was given a Singapore from the perspective of four Filipino migrant domestic workers and their employers.

I was invested in looking at Singapore through their eyes and following these four characters journey, they were all well fleshed out and so different. Cora, older, more experience domestic worker returning to Singapore soon after the loss of her only son; Donita, young, confident, sometimes abrasive. Angel, a down-to-earth Lesbian navigating society’s mores as best as she can, and the more elusive Flordeliza.

We have also the employer’s: from Cora’s kind-hearted, humanistic Ma’am Elizabeth to Donita’s power hungry, masochist Mrs Fan Poh Choo and others with greyer shades in between like the Vijays. Singapore has the world's highest percentage of millionaires, with one out of every six households having at least one million US dollars in disposable wealth. All these rich people being heavily dependent on agencies like Merry Maids to find them reliable, humble servants who are tied to horrendous working rules to stay in employment, with little, almost no protection. This is a place where money talks, and justice is not blind.

A quarter of the world’s 11.5 million migrant domestic workers are women from the Philippines (many working in Singapore), often unseen until something goes wrong. And it’s all going reasonably well, until one of the employers is found dead by her own daughter, and one of the helpers is accused of murder. Suddenly all these domestic workers turn into potential criminals, their lives descending into hell. The stakes are high, another innocent person could die, capital punishment is a legal and enforced penalty in Singapore.

Jawal takes us on a fascinating journey of love, loss, the search for justice, freedom and equality in a world where ethics, compassion and humanity seem to be quickly evaporating. Now You See Us is ultimately a story about the erosion of human rights in a contemporary world slowly taken over by Megachurches, US hired trans-bi-homophobic preachers and their ultra-moralistic religious views.

Now You See Us is well researched and very enlightening. Jawal has a knack to depict the plight of these domestic workers and create successful moments of tension in a narration that is peppered with poignancy and humour. It's almost pitch-perfect, and it could be another fifty pages longer, I could have done with a bit more information on Flor’s character and the end felt slightly neat and rushed. Nevertheless, all the storylines were captivating, some more heart-breaking than others. This can be cruel world, but we can change it, just seek the beauty of small act of kindness.

Jawal herself said that she ‘wrote this novel with hope for more dignity, compassion and recognition of women like Cora, Angel, Donita and Flordeliza’. Let’s all hope for that too.

Now You See Us goes into #pudseyreccomends

Thanks NetGalley for the Advance Review Copy.

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