And the Rain My Drink

It is 1948 and the British in Malaya are struggling to put down a Communist uprising and deal with rising nationalism in the colony. Chinese girl Suyin falls in love with a British police officer and is able to see both sides of the war but she sympathizes more with the Communist guerrillas and is critical of the British colonials. A much-loved classic featuring a new foreword by Dr Leon Comber.

Through a collection of letters written to his best friend and to his father in England, and from his own personal diary entries, John Dodd''s memoir offers a fascinating and amusing glimpse of life as a colonial rubber planter. With true stories and confessions that would make even Somerset Maugham blush, we discover what life was really like for young colonial planters in late-1950s Malaya. Increasing daily rubber output may have been their goal but for the young planters the bigger picture of chasing girls and finding a ‘keep'' was of much greater importance. But life was more than just a series of stengahs in the clubhouse, dalliances in the Chinese brothels of Penang and charming ‘pillow dictionaries'' – there were strikes, riots, snakes, plantation fires and deadly ambushes by Communist terrorists to contend with. Set against the backdrop of the Emergency period, the rise of nationalism and Malaya''s subsequent Independence, A Company of Planters is a very personal, moving and humorous account of one man''s experiences on the frequently isolated rubber plantations of colonial Malaya.