‘Names Have Been Changed’ by Yu-Mei Balasingamchow

I was so disappointed with this one. I seem to have fallen into a run of books with fantastic premises that completely fail to deliver, and unfortunately Names Have Been Changed was another.

The novel follows “Ophir”, a Singaporean woman who has spent the last ten years on the run after becoming implicated in a money laundering scheme. Deciding it’s finally time to tell her side of the story, she launches a podcast to recount everything that led to her becoming one of Singapore’s most wanted.

Because each chapter is presented as an episode of the podcast, they’re considerably longer than I usually enjoy. That’s more of a personal preference than a criticism of the book itself, but I do think this format would work far better as an audiobook. There are several moments where Ophir explains Singaporean pronunciation or the way certain phrases are spoken, and those felt like they were crying out to be heard rather than read.

The biggest issue for me, though, was Ophir herself. I just never connected with her. There were moments where I sympathised with the losses she experiences and the devastating consequences of being separated from her family for so many years, but beyond that I found her difficult to invest in.

I also expected a much wilder story. Ophir builds up the extraordinary life she’s led while on the run, but whenever it seemed we were about to delve into the darker or more dangerous aspects, the narrative pulled back. She repeatedly alludes to having done things she isn’t proud of to survive but never really expands on them, which left me feeling short changed. There was one particularly tense encounter involving someone from her past that raised the stakes and made me want to carry on reading, but the momentum quickly faded after that series of events were concluded.

There were also moments that felt a little too self-aware for me. Lines such as “it’s my podcast and I’ll cry if I want to” (not quoted verbatim, just from memory! pulled me out of the story rather than drawing me further in, and the podcast framing occasionally tipped into feeling gimmicky.

One thing I did genuinely love was the sense of place. Balasingamchow brings Singapore vividly to life, and reading about its culture and everyday life from Ophir’s perspective was easily one of the highlights. It made me realise how little I knew about the country and left me wanting to learn more.

Overall, this was a frustrating read. The premise promised an engrossing story of life on the run, but the execution never quite found its bite. If anything, I think this is a novel that would benefit from being experienced only as an audiobook, where the podcast format could really come into its own.