Thammika Songkaeo

Thammika Songkaeo is the author of Stamford Hospital, a debut novel selected as a must-read for International Women’s Day alongside The Handmaid’s Tale and The Second Sex. Set over a single weekend, the novel follows a woman who hospitalises her barely-ill child − not out of neglect, but sheer exhaustion − using the institution as a temporary refuge from a life she had not expected: one defined by full-time motherhood and a sexless marriage in Singapore, a place she never agreed to be.

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Praised by Elle Singapore for "dissecting motherhood, marriage, and the cost of selfhood with razor-sharp precision," the book has sparked wide discussion on maternal ambivalence, sexual desire, and the limits placed on women's choices.

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Thammika was the instructor behind the sold-out masterclass Writing Fear, Anger, and Sadness at the Auckland Writers Festival, and she advocates for greater global literary equality for authors worldwide.

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She is currently working on her second novel, writing with the experience of having faced a lawsuit over her first. As a third-culture author publishing across countries with vastly different legal consequences, Thammika constantly negotiates how to expose uncomfortable realities through fiction while navigating the threats of crippling fines and legal censorship.