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'How To Charge Rent From Someone Living In My Heart,' reads a title most people can relate to, splashed across a massive book. Behind it, hides a woman wearing a mask and huge, star-shaped sunglasses. Get acquainted with @womanwithbooks, a 28-year-old digital creator that's on her way to becoming Singapore's latest rising star. Her anonymous account has been making its rounds lately, with pictures of a woman on the MRT holding up books with similarly uproarious and witty titles.
Of course, we had to catch the elusive creator for an interview. Our first question? Is @womanwithbooks meant to be a funny – and local – parody of the viral @hotdudesreading Instagram?
"Hot dudes reading!! I love that account! Who doesn't love hotties!" she replies. "I guess what links us together are scenes are both happening on the trains and related to books. And what differentiates us is they are hotties – and I’m sadly not."
While @womanwithbooks has now garnered over 2,000 followers on Instagram, the origins of the account wasn't at all planned. An idea was spurred after watching Hollywood Blockbuster film Crazy Rich Asians. "I thought, how about creating a book cover that shouts out that movie in Singapore, where it was filmed."
The result is a book cover cheekily titled How To Find A Crazy Rich Husband.
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"The movie was my first inspiration, and the other book covers are inspired by the daily conversations of millennials," @womanwithbooks tells us. "I remember one time I had the book 'How To Hide Your Insanity' and the couple sat right across me was trying so hard to hide their smiles."
After all, her aim is to be an uplifting virtual space in today's otherwise dreary world. The content creator just hopes to spread joy and laughter in the Lion City. "I do this purely to cheer people up during these difficult COVID-19 times," she tells us.
But it's not all a walk in the park either. Her posts may just be seemingly-simply shots taken on the MRT, but a lot of effort goes into the whole process.
"I come up with the book titles and design the book covers and then send them to a print shop," she says. "I don't have a team behind this but I do have lovely friends to support me along the way."
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