Chairs

by Christopher G. Moore

Chairs is a collection of sixteen original stories. The voices are those of Bangkok based freelance journalists and their invited guests. Each Saturday morning, over coffee, the members of Chairs gather to share the latest gossip, scandals, myths, dangers, exploits, and loves that bind together their small community. Sam Kohl is a narrator of the main stories, and Sam reveals, with perfect timing and ingenious twists, the clash of cultures as expats meet Thais, Chinese, Karen, and Burmese. Chairs is a search for redemption with stops at the Oriental Hotel, Pattaya, the Thermae, and the jungles of Burma. Along this journey you enter a vividly created world populated by adventurers, body snatchers, executioners, dreamers, collectors, diplomats, mistresses, ghosts, and war veterans.

326 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 22, 2009

About the author

Christopher G. Moore is a Canadian author who has lived in Thailand since 1988. Formerly a law professor at the University of British Columbia and a practicing lawyer, Moore has become a public figure in Southeast Asia, known for his novels and essays that have captured the spirit and social transformation of Southeast Asia over the past three decades.

Moore has written over 30 fiction and non-fiction books, including the Vincent Calvino novels which have won including the Shamus Award and German Critics Award and have been translated to over a dozen languages. Moore’s books and essays are a study of human nature, culture, power, justice, technological change and its implications on society and human rights.

Starting in 2017, the London-based Christopher G. Moore Foundation awards an annual literary prize to books advancing awareness on human rights. He’s also the founder of Changing Climate, Changing Lives Film Festival 2020.

Reviews

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting collection of short stories told through the eyes of a group of expat freelance journalists in Bangkok.

Like any short story collection, there are hits and there are misses, but each tells an interesting, sometimes hidden side of Thai culture, politics and daily life and its collision with westerners (farangs) .

[David Frazier · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's a worthy premise -- a weekly coffee klatch by a ragtag group of Bangkok expat journalists -- and some of the stories make for some very good Bangkok lore, but the writing feels a bit lazy, which is unfortunate, because with such rich material this could've been quite good.

[Ken · Rating 3 out of 5]

Felt pretentious, though maybe it went over my head; chronically unfunny, which I am quite sure it was.