SG HORROR NOW!
Whatever happened to Singapore horror? From the ‘50s to ‘90s, this was one of our country’s most beloved literary genres, with beloved tales of pontianaks and hungry ghosts flying off the shelves. But in recent years, it’s fallen out of the spotlight, with fewer authors specialising in this field, even as Singaporean fantasy and sci-fi makes waves abroad.
Our Halloween panel brings together two horror writers—YA novelist Xie Shi Min and comics creator Sean Lam—to revel in the spookiness of the season, and to discuss timely questions with the help of moderator Brandon David Servos. What defines the Singaporean horror writing scene now, and how can it grow in the future?
This marks the first of a series of SFF events by the new literary collective Speculative Fiction Singapore.
Panelists:
Xie Shi Min is a Singaporean speculative fiction author who grew up reading and listening to local ghost stories, myths and legends. Her latest YA paranormal thriller, Ghost Hunters of Geylang (2025), was shortlisted for the Popular Readers’ Choice Awards. Her debut book is a middle grade novel Dragonhearted, which was shortlisted for the Singapore Book Awards in 2017 and won the Hedwig Anuar’s Children’s Book in 2018. To bring greater authenticity to all her work, Xie explores pursuits such as Chinese calligraphy and motorcycle riding, and is thinking of glass blowing next.
Based in both Singapore and the United States, Sean Lam is an author and artist renowned for his graphic novels, including a two-part adaptation of the New York Times bestselling sci-fi novel Ringworld. In 2012, he received an award at the Angoulême Christian Comics Festival for his work on Judith: Captive to Conqueror. In Singapore, he is also well-known for his popular graphic novel series Geungsi, an action-horror story inspired by Asian folklore set in Singapore, Asia, and the world. He recently launched a full-colour graphic novel title, Raffles Hotel: The Grande Dame and the Waving Blade, as part of the 5th Raffles Hotel Singapore Writer's Residency programme in 2026. He is the first graphic novelist in the programme to combine both illustration and writing beyond traditional prose.
Moderator:
Brandon David Servos is a Singaporean writer whose work has appeared in The Sengkang Sci-Fi Journal, Margins and Voyage. In the University of Michigan’s 2025 Hopwood Awards, he received First Place in Undergraduate Nonfiction, and Fourth Place in the Novel. He was an assistant director, writer and performer in Birdwatching, a horror production about political apathy in Singapore that combined butoh with spoken word, performed in NUS this year. Under the Decolonial Book Club, he hosts film screenings and facilitates conversations around colonial legacy. He is currently working on an eco-horror novel through the Singapore Book Council’s Emerging Writer Mentorship.