Hiatus by Budak Tomato | Book Review

November 13, 2017


Another book of Budak Tomato. 

I've read Esc and I totally love it. I have a slight of high expectation on Hiatus ever since I saw the promotion on Twitter. Well, I followed Budak Tomato and Muharikah on Twitter and totally love most of their tweets :D

I even bought the book directly from Imanshoppe haha see how excited I am to look forward to this book.


Title: Hiatus
Author: Budak Tomato
Pages: 307
Publisher: Iman Publications
Publication Date: October 2017

When I read the synopsis at the back of the book, my feeling mixed. It is not like I haven't read it from the promotion tweets, but it felt different - to finally able to read the piece and to be honest, to reflect myself with the lessons from the book. 

"Hidup ini perjalanan yang akhirnya bukan pada mati.

Buku ini baris-baris tulisan pada kamu,
Tapi setiap baris-baris ini ibarat garis-garis luka torehan
pada lengan dan peha aku.

Buku ini sekadar buku pada kamu.
Tapi buku ini dipenuhi rahsia aku.

Buku ini mungkin sekadar cerita menagih simpati pada hematmu.
Tapi buku ini luahan jiwa gersan yang memerlukan cinta, pada aku.

Yang kamu pegang ini lebih daripada sebuah buku.
Ini sebahagian daripada jiwa aku.
Ini luka aku.
Ini kecewa aku.
Ini ubat penenang aku.
Ini cinta aku.
Ini air mata aku.
Dan ini, realiti aku.

Ini mungkin, fiksyen kamu.
Tapi bukan, pada aku."


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The book is like a novel, sharing stories of Amir Talhah and his life, featuring quite a number of people especially his friends, his parents, his sisters and others - someone he fall in love with, someone who felt in love with him, someone who is going to help him, someone who is going to put him into troubles. Different types of people who actually exist in our own life too. 

Is it a real story?

Don't ask me, I have no idea. -_-'
Only the author and Allah know it.

Towards the end of the book, I read this line saying, "Untuk yang mencari maksud literal dalam jurnal peribadi aku, kau akan gagal cari moral. Percayalah." To be honest, this book puts me into huge confusion. Maybe my imagination is on not that high level to understand but for me personally, this is a heavy book deep inside. T_T


This book also reflects the reality of life - people with histories (that seem to be bad for other people) whose nightmares hold them from changing into a better person. Even, as people who encounter these people, are we going to close our eyes and ignore the facts that they need us? Plus, are we going to accept them to be in our life if they really want to improve themselves? And even if they are not able to change, are we going to keep supporting them?

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For this book review, not going to share life lessons I learned as wow I felt too overwhelmed to put the experiences into words reading it. 

But, I will share few parts in the book that I can relate and I found them interesting :) 

Haha entah-entah end up akan jadi ala-ala life lessons jugak. Susah sebenarnya nak keep on reading  books dan belajar sesuatu perkara yang baru dan CONTINUOUSLY APPLY life lessons tu. T_T


1. Distances.
"Kadang yang menjarak tak terasa jarak. Kadang yang terjarak terasa sesak. Kadang yang mencipta jarak ingin membaiki retak. Kadang yang retak itu terbaiki dengan menghubung jarak." - Czsull.

2. Give up?
"Andai jalan takdirku menjadi doktor, jadikanlah aku doktor yang tak mudah mengalah. Mengalah pada masalah. Mengalah pada mehnah. Atau mengalah pada tohmah."

3. Happiness. 
"Bahagia itu tak akan didapati dengan ingin bahagia, melainkan dengan banyak mensyukuri karunia yang ada." - Kyai Haji Abdullah Gynmastiar

4. Dosa.
"Bila kita mula tinggalkan dosa, hidup kita akan lebih bahagia. Bila kita mendekat dengan Allah, hidup kita terasa sempurna." Qiden.

5. Hope.
"Harapan itu masih ada, kita hanya harus terus percaya."

Have you realised that it is actually quite easy to change but it is way harder to be consistent in those changes that we have made?

To fulfill 5 times of prayer from not praying at all is easier than to continuously praying 5 times a day.
To stop smoking is easier than to continuously stop smoking.
To stop saying bad words is easier than to keep on not saying them.
To start covering our aurat properly is easier than to continue covering them. 



Well, people are different.
What is difficult to me may be easy to other people. 😅

May Allah bless our efforts. 

SS, Perak, Malaysia
171113



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