In this gripping queer YA romance perfect for fans of Casey McQuiston and Becky Albertalli, an Asian American teen longs to break free of the conservative cult she was raised in.
Valerie Danners is in a cult. She just doesn’t know it yet. But when she stumbles upon a queer romance novel at the library, everything about her life—centered around a conservative Christian homeschool cult—is thrown into question.
Worst of all, there’s a new girl in town. Riley is rebellious, kindhearted, and impossibly cool. As the two bond over being multiracial teens in their very white and very religious community, Valerie finds herself falling in love.
Soon Valerie and Riley are exchanging notes in secret and stealing kisses behind the church. But even as their romance blooms, Valerie knows that they’re trapped. If Valerie wants a chance at writing her own story, she must choose between staying with a family she fears will never accept her or running away with the girl she loves.
Interview with Natalie Naudus
Q: An author’s first published book isn’t necessarily the first book they’ve ever written with the intent to publish, but as I understand it, Gay the Pray Away was your first. Did you feel like you were in over your head, and what kinds of tools and supports helped you navigate the book writing process?
A: I’ve worked in publishing for a while because of my job as an audiobook narrator, and many author friends were so kind and generous with their advice. Thanks to them, I wasn’t going in blind. I’ve tried to write books before and never finished them–but this felt like the story that I needed to tell. And while I wrote it I kept telling myself, you don’t have to publish it, this can just be between you and Google docs. But when I finished and had some friends read it, they really encouraged me to put it out there.
Q: Gay the Pray Away was originally self-published before being acquired by Quirk Books. What was that process of transitioning to traditional publishing like, and what were the biggest differences between the two experiences for you?
A: I originally tried to traditionally publish the book and signed an agent pretty quickly, but the book didn’t sell on sub. I did get some feedback that there was interest if I’d be willing to do a rewrite, but I didn’t want to make significant changes, and my agent was lovely and encouraged me to publish it myself. Because I self-published, I was able to have complete control over the process, which was wonderful as it’s such a personal story. I picked my cover artist, my editor, and kept the story true to my vision for a book about healing queer religious trauma, rather than sensationalizing it.
Q: What was the hardest part about writing this book? What got you through the toughest patches?
A: It was hard writing such a personal story. The plot didn’t happen to me, but the setting, a queer girl in a conservative Christian homeschooling cult, was very real. I took lots of breaks, I cried, and then I blew my nose and wrote some more.
Q: I’ve seen a lot of authors mention that they will read their writing out loud to get a feel for how their words and sentences sound and flow. Did you do a lot of this while drafting and editing your book? Do you think your experience as an audiobook narrator influenced your approach to writing prose, and if so, how?
A: Because I record so many books, I can hear text really well as I look at it, so I think that helped. I had a strong idea of how the characters sounded and who they were, even though I didn’t read much of the book aloud until I was recording the audiobook.
I think because I read so many books, I wanted to write something deeply personal, something I was uniquely qualified to express. There are so many books, so many voices in the world. I wanted to provide something that I hadn’t seen, but could really use.
Q: In the Q&A at the back of the book, you mention you found yourself drawn to writing Gay the Pray Away because you felt this was a story you were uniquely positioned to tell. Now that your debut is out in the world, what other kinds of stories are you thinking about telling? Do you see yourself writing for middle grade or adult or other audiences too?
A: I write Sapphic erotica with my partner, and it’s so fun to write and produce that together, both on our Patreon and in book form. I do plan to write a poly romance eventually: it’ll either be fictionalized or simply telling how I fell in love with two people, but I’m excited to share another unique story that I would have loved to have had as I was navigating those changes. Just to know that there can be happy endings for people with unconventional stories.
Natalie Naudus is one of the most beloved audiobook narrators working today. She has won an Audie Award and eleven Earphones Awards and maintains a robust social media following. She lives with her family on a mountain in Virginia.
Thanks for joining me for this year’s Taiwanese American Heritage Week interviews! As of the publication of this post, it is no longer technically even Taiwanese American Heritage Week, but due to the sheer number of authors I interviewed this year (a record nine!), the posts ran into the next week, so here we are.
Due to various reasons, I haven’t kept up with blogging regularly anymore, but because this particular project means a lot to me, I have continued to do it every year through thick and thin. I imagine that even if my blog otherwise becomes an archive of my old posts from 2016-2020, this interview series will bring it back to life during one month of the year by putting the spotlight on Taiwanese authors publishing in the Anglosphere, new and old. This year was noteworthy in that all of the interviewees were first-timers in terms of appearing on my blog and nearly all of them were debut authors. Because of the number of new Taiwanese authors has grown a lot since I first started doing this interview series, I ended up giving priority to the debuts and the people who haven’t featured before on my blog when curating my pool of authors to interview, even though I would have loved to feature past authors with new books out again this year. That said, this wrap-up post, which lists other recent and upcoming books by Taiwanese authors, is my chance to feature the books by authors that I didn’t get to interview for TAHW.
Disclaimer: Even though I searched far and wide, I’m sure there are some books I’ve missed (every year I end up finding more after the fact). If you know of any others, feel free to leave a comment, and if you’re a Taiwanese author yourself who wants to get in touch about being interviewed in the future, please do not hesitate to use my contact form to reach out!
Note: I have divided up the books by target age group, with the exception of the final section that highlights translated literature from Taiwan. For books with multiple creators where not all of the creators are Taiwanese, I have underlined the names of the Taiwanese creators (this it to the best of my knowledge based on publicly available information that I found through Google searches; feel free to correct me if you know otherwise).
Picturebooks
Dreams to Ashes: The 1871 Los Angeles Chinatown Massacre by Livia Blackburne and Nicole Xu
In the mid-1800s, a wave of Chinese immigrants traveled to the West Coast of the United States. They were following rumors of Gold Mountain, a land rich with treasure for all who came. When gold proved elusive, they began to seek their fortunes in other ways―as doctors and launderers, as cooks and musicians.
A number of Chinese immigrants settled in Los Angeles, California. It was a rough, occasionally lawless city, and newspapers routinely published anti-Chinese articles, fueling sparks of hatred. On the night of October 24, 1871, the city exploded in violence. In the ensuing massacre, eighteen Chinese men were killed, their dreams turned to ashes.
New York Times bestselling author Livia Blackburne and illustrator Nicole Xu illuminate a tragic episode in our nation’s past in the hope that future generations can move toward a brighter tomorrow.
Nainai’s Mountain by Livia Blackburne and Joey Chou
A Taiwanese-American girl is nervous about visiting Taiwan— until her paternal grandmother, her Nainai, takes her on a mountain-climbing adventure and shows her its wonders.
Traveling from California to Taiwan for the first time, even with her parents and her Nainai around her, is a lot for a little girl to take in. The plane ride lasts forever, she can’t read any of the signs, and she’s worried there will be unfamiliar bugs.
But then Nainai becomes her tour guide, and Taiwan transforms. As they huff and puff up Nainai’s favorite mountain, stomachs full of bao and juicy sausage, Nainai spins yarns about riding to the movies in pedicabs, eating frozen pineapple, and playing pinball to win snacks. Even the bugs turn out to be more cool than scary.
At the top of the mountain is a surprise: all sorts of people playing and exercising—and they all remember Nainai. The little girl is filled with pride when they can tell just who she is: “your granddaughter!”
Author Livia Blackburne shares an author’s note about the inspiration she drew from childhood visits to Taiwan, her parents’ childhoods there, and her own mountain-climbing grandmother. The deep well of lived experience is evident on every page, and is perfectly evoked by Joey Chou’s intricate, colorful illustration. Whether it’s a reflection of home or a window into somewhere brand-new, kids, grandparents, and everyone in between will love following Nainai to the top of her mountain.
A deeply moving, gorgeously illustrated picture book about leaving home and finding a new place to fit in, for anyone dealing with a move, to another town or to a new country.
Sometimes we leave home in the mornings, in the evenings, or for much longer. But we always come back.
Home becomes a wish when we move, when the new place isn’t the same. Everything might be different: the sounds, the smell, the people, the weather.
But home isn’t just a place. We carry home in our hearts, and it can grow and change as we do in our lives. With time, new faces become friends, and what is different becomes familiar.
Home can be a wish that comes true.
Like Evelyn Del Rey Is Moving Away and The Day You Begin, this beautiful exploration of what it’s like to deal with a big change is personal, emotionally resonant, and relatable. With page after lovely page of captivating art, New York Times bestselling illustrator Julia Kuo has created a lasting story about how time, patience, and an open heart can help someone feel at home anywhere in the world.
From the creator of the beloved webcomic The Oxherd Boy, comes this dazzling, gorgeously illustrated picture book about a little boy who learns he is big enough to do big things.
Little Ah-Fu has a big imagination, but he can’t imagine being the Oxherd Boy . . . yet.
When the day comes for Ah-Fu to bring the huge family ox home from the woods, he worries that he’s not big enough to do the job.
Will fear and self-doubt drive Ah-Fu home empty-handed? Or can he rely on his wits and compassion to become the Oxherd Boy his family expects—and prove to himself that he is, indeed, big enough?
Delightfully paired with exquisite illustrations, this empowering story inspired by traditional Chinese philosophy shows kids big and small how to trust themselves and embrace what they can be.
The Beat of the Dragon Boat by Christina Matula and Nicole Wong
A young boy learns about the Chinese Dragon Boat Festival from his grandfather when he attends his first dragon boat race.
The Chinese Dragon Boat Festival takes place on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar, ushering in the start of summer. On the night before the Dragon Boat Festival, a young boy asks his grandfather how the dragon boat races first began. His grandfather tells him that legend has it that the races started in the ancient time of the Dragon King, when every lake and river had a guardian dragon. Dragons symbolize good luck, and have great power, especially over water and weather.
On race day at the harbor, all the boats have a carved dragon head on their bows. As a final touch, to wake up their team’s boat, the boy paints in the dragon’s eye. But once the race is underway, their team’s dragon boat is in last place. How can they wake their dragon?
Pei’s Pineapple Cakes by Crystal Z. Lee and Allie Su
While visiting her grandmother in central Taiwan, Pei finds herself in the middle of a mystery. The pineapple cakes from her grandmother’s bakery have disappeared! Soon Pei is collecting clues as she embarks on a quest to find the missing pineapple cakes.
From the traditional Taiwanese artisans’ craftsmanship to the picturesque villages of central Taiwan, Pei discovers the beauty of her grandmother’s home. This is a story of courage, adventure, and the love between grandchildren and grandparents.
Icy Fruit: How My Grandfather Spread the Joy of Ice Pops Across Taiwan by Charlotte Cheng and Vivian Mineker
This fun and fascinating biography of a Taiwanese ice pop entrepreneur—the author’s beloved grandfather—is a terrific read-aloud about inventiveness and the treats of summer. Charlotte Cheng’s grandfather always had a bag of coins rustling in his pocket. That bag carried with it “a story of joyful jingles, sultry summers, and fresh frozen fruit which began in 1965 in the lush valleys and mountains of an island called Taiwan.”
This story of Agong’s Icy Fruit company, from first inspired idea through experimentation to countrywide success, is a lyrical, lively, and richly illustrated read that’s part biography, part family tribute, and part celebration of summer. Gather round for Icy Fruit!
A beautifully illustrated tale of immigration and imagination, about the struggle to fit into a new place, make new friends, and see yourself in new stories—from Bo Lu, Ezra Jack Keats Illustrator Honor-winning author-illustrator of Bao’s Doll
When her family moves to a new country, Ren is heartbroken to leave Popo and her magical stories behind. In her new home, nothing feels familiar—until Ren discovers that, with her pencil, she can bring to life what she can’t find the words to say. Through drawing, she bridges the gap between her two worlds and transforms her loneliness into a meaningful connection.
Inspired by the childhood experiences of award-winning author-illustrator Bo Lu, this heartfelt picture book is a celebration of resilience, friendship, and finding a sense of belonging through art and storytelling.
Join Mei Mei on her hilarious and emotional journey in this dramatic and tenderhearted picture book about guilt and forgiveness, from the acclaimed creator of We Are Definitely Human.
When Mei Mei accidentally breaks her ama’s favorite cup, she’s convinced it’s the end of the world. What if Ama is angry? What if she yells? What if she kicks Mei Mei out of her house? Mei Mei can’t face it. But when Mimi, the innocent cat who witnesses her crime, ends up being blamed, the guilt is too much! Mimi’s accusing eyes follow Mei Mei until she just can’t take it anymore, and the truth comes spilling out.
With vibrant and moody cinematic illustrations and pitch-perfect pacing, X. Fang’s newest picture book is filled to the brim with comedic drama and the comforting sweetness of a grandparent’s forgiving hug.
In this charming sibling bond picture book, a young boy fights boredom by imagining all the adventures he could have, but forgets that he has a built-in adventure partner right by his side.
It’s only the second day of summer, and Max is completely out of things to do. As he cycles through a series of fantastical ideas, Max can’t stop thinking how much more summer fun he could have–only if he were somewhere else!
But by not being present, could Max be missing out on the most special adventure of all? And is he missing out on someone to share his adventures with?
This funny and imaginative story highlights the specialness of a sibling bond and reminds readers of all ages that sometimes the best things can be found right where you are.
Outsider Kids (Parachute Kids #2) by Betty C. Tang
Can one spoiled cousin upend three kids’ hard-won happiness? Find out in this hilarious, big-hearted, high stakes companion to the award-winning bestseller Parachute Kids! Perfect for fans of School Trip, A First Time for Everything, The Tryout, and The Squad.
WITH FAMILY LIKE THIS, WHO NEEDS ENEMIES?
After seven months on their own as undocumented immigrants, the Lin siblings have settled into their new lives in California. Sis has a new job, Bro has a new crush, and Feng-Li (Ann) is excited to celebrate her eleventh birthday with her new friends. Their parents still await visa approval in Taiwan, so the trio is trying to take better care of one another and stay under the radar of immigration authorities.
But when their cousin Josephine-a violin prodigy-arrives with her privilege and demands, suddenly their world is turned upside down. Will they have to give up the life and the stability they worked so hard to achieve?
From award-winning and bestselling author of Where the Mountain Meets the Moon Grace Lin comes a gorgeously full-color illustrated story about a lion cub and a girl who must open a portal for the spirits, based on Chinese folklore.
Jin is a Stone Lion—one of the guardians of the Old City Gate who is charged to watch over humans and protect the Sacred Sphere. But to Jin, those boring duties feel like a waste of time.
What isn’t a waste of time? Perfecting his zuqiu kick, scoring a Golden Goal, and becoming the most legendary player of all the spirit world.
But when Jin’s perfect kick accidentally knocks the Sacred Sphere out through the gate, he has no choice but to run after it, tumbling out of the realm he calls home and into the human world as the gate closes behind him.
Stuck outside the gate, Jin must find help from unlikely allies, including a girl who can hear a mysterious voice and a worm who claims he is a dragon. Together, they must find the sphere and return it to the world beyond the gate…or risk losing everything.
Award-winning and bestselling author Grace Lin returns with another gorgeously illustrated adventure story about duty, love, and balance—expertly written in the vein of the Newbery Honor winner and modern classic Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. Based on Chinese Folklore, this beautiful novel features ten full-page pieces of stunning full-color art, as well as intricate chapter header illustrations.
Beasts of the Uncanny Wild (Creatures of the In Between #2) by Cindy Lin
Prince Jin and his companions face new adventures, new dangers, and more mythical beasts in this thrilling sequel to Creatures of the In Between, perfect for fans of Princess Mononoke and How to Train Your Dragon and featuring an immersive blend of East and Southeast Asian mythology.
Prince Jin is now the emperor of the Three Realms. His first task? Bring the uncanny creatures back to his home.
Yet his attempts are plagued at every turn. And when the magical creatures—even Jin’s own monstermates—begin to act out in strange and alarming ways, the situation only gets worse.
Jin’s search for answers leads him to the very place from which all monsters originate: deep within the Uncanny Wild, where sacred peaks are surrounded by a primordial forest…from which no one has ever returned.
But as Jin and his friends make their way through the enchanted lands, Jin realizes that all is not as it seems. The enemy that waits for him there is not who he expected—and that’s just the beginning.
Fans of Dragon Pearl and When the Sea Turned to Silver will thrill at this next step of Jin’s action-packed journey as he faces greater odds than ever before with his friends by his side.
A globe-spanning treasure hunt with puzzles to solve . . .
This latest YA novel by acclaimed writer Gloria Chao takes readers on a soaring adventure through love, loss, and the lively streets of Taiwan.
For Gemma’s whole life, it has always been her and her mom against the world. As far as she knew, all her grandparents—and thus her ties to Taiwanese culture—were dead. Until one day when a mysterious man shows up at her door with two shocking things: the news that her grandfather has just recently passed, and the first clue to a treasure hunt that Gemma hopes will lead to her inheritance.
There’s just one major problem: to complete the hunt, she has to go to her grandfather’s home in Taiwan. And the only way Gemma can get there is by asking her ex and biggest high-school rival, Xander, for help. But after swallowing her pride, she finds herself halfway across the world, ready to unearth her life-changing prize. Soon Gemma discovers that the treasure hunt is about much more than money—it’s about finally learning about her family, her cultural roots, and maybe even finding true love.
Filled with ingenious puzzles, a vibrant Taipei setting, and a delicious romance, Ex Marks the Spot is an exciting adventure by award-winning writer Gloria Chao, perfect for fans of Loveboat Taipei, The Inheritance Games, and Thirteen Little Blue Envelopes.
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Judy I. Lin comes a brand-new series featuring the unsung heroes behind legendary events within the world of Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra
There is no war outside of these walls.
This is what the citizens of Ba Sing Se are told to believe, but Jin knows better. As a refugee whose parents were killed by the Fire Nation, she is haunted by her past. Now, she does her best to keep her head down in the Lower Ring, caring for her ailing grandfather and balancing school with survival.
Her one bright spot is her best friend Susu, whose family treats Jin like one of their own, and whose bakery she helps make deliveries for.
Her world shatters when Susu’s father gambles away the bakery and Susu is forced to take a contract in the Upper Ring to pay off the family’s debt. Jin vows to help her friend—no matter what it takes. A chain of events fueled by her desperate promise leads Jin to Xuan, an arrogant boy from the Middle Ring with ties to the Silver Fangs, a major player in the city’s black market.
The deeper Jin delves into her double life, the more she learns about Susu’s own entanglement in a conspiracy darker and more dangerous than she could have imagined.
As whispers swirl of the Avatar’s presence within the city’s walls, the Fire Nation creeps ever closer. With Ba Sing Se teetering on the brink of revolution, Jin must defy the powerful forces that control her city and risk everything for the friend she’s determined to save.
Love, family, and food collide in this sparkling Romeo and Juliet-inspired romance.
Julie Wu and Randall Hur used to be best friends. Now they only see each other on Saturdays at the Pasadena Farmers Market where their once close families are long-standing rivals.
When Julie and Randall are paired with ultra-rich London Kim for a community-service school project, they are forced to work together for the first time in years. It quickly becomes obvious that London has a major crush on Julie. But Julie can’t stop thinking about Randall. And Randall can’t stop thinking about how London is thinking about Julie. Soon, prompted by a little jealousy and years of missing each other, school project meetings turn into pseudo dates at their favorite Taiwanese breakfast shop and then secret kisses at the beach—far from the watchful eyes of their families.
Just as they’re finally feeling brave enough to tell their grandmas, the two matriarchs rehash their old fight and Julie and Randall get caught in the middle and Julie’s brother finds out they are dating. Their families are heartbroken.
But it’s the Year of the Dragon, an auspicious time to resolve disagreements and start anew, and Randall isn’t going down without fighting for what—and who—they love. Could the Lunar New Year provide not only a second chance for Randall and Julie, but for their families as well?
A young warrior dreams of proving his worth in the elite Guardian Tournament, fighting not only for himself but the fate of everything he loves.
Sixteen-year-old Jun dreams of proving his worth as a warrior in the elite Guardian’s Tournament, held every six years to entrust the magical Scroll of Heaven to a new protector. Eager to prove his skills, Jun hopes that a win will restore his father’s pride—righting a horrible mistake that caused their banishment from his home, mother, and twin brother.
But Jun’s father strictly forbids him from participating. He believes there is no future in Jun honing his skills as a warrior, especially considering Jun is not breathmarked, born with a patch of dragon scales and blessed with special abilities like his twin. Determined to be the next Guardian, Jun stows away in the wagon of Chang and his daughter, Ren, performers on their way to the capital where the tournament will take place.
As Jun competes, he quickly realizes he may be fighting for not just a better life, but the fate of the country itself and the very survival of everyone he cares about.
In this gripping queer YA romance perfect for fans of Casey McQuiston and Becky Albertalli, an Asian American teen longs to break free of the conservative cult she was raised in.
Valerie Danners is in a cult. She just doesn’t know it yet. But when she stumbles upon a queer romance novel at the library, everything about her life—centered around a conservative Christian homeschool cult—is thrown into question.
Worst of all, there’s a new girl in town. Riley is rebellious, kindhearted, and impossibly cool. As the two bond over being multiracial teens in their very white and very religious community, Valerie finds herself falling in love.
Soon Valerie and Riley are exchanging notes in secret and stealing kisses behind the church. But even as their romance blooms, Valerie knows that they’re trapped. If Valerie wants a chance at writing her own story, she must choose between staying with a family she fears will never accept her or running away with the girl she loves.
In this laugh-out-loud murder mystery, three women dating the same man band together to get revenge, but when they discover his body, they’ll need to solve his murder before they go down for it.
The body in the closet was going to be a problem. Kathryn Hu knew it. Yes, Tucker Jones was a cheating scumbag, and yes, she’d agreed to meet Olivia and Elle—Tucker’s other girlfriends—to exact revenge for all he’d put them through… But then they found him. Dead.
Do they look guilty? Yes.
Do they feel guilty for having wished him dead just hours before? Maybe a little.
But—solid motive and a crime scene covered in their DNA aside—they’re innocent. They swear.
To clear their names, Kat, Olivia, and Elle team up to find the real killer. But as they go undercover and lie to everyone, including the hot detective working the case, they realize that every person in their ex’s life had a reason to want him dead. Will they uncover the truth before they go down for a murder they didn’t commit?
Filled with humor and shenanigans, The Ex-Girlfriend Murder Club is a romp of an adventure by award-winning author Gloria Chao, perfect for fans of Dial A for Aunties, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It and John Tucker Must Die.
The Glowing Life of Leeann Wu by Ruby Lang (writing as Mindy Hung)
A seemingly inexplicable magic takes over the lives of three generations of women in this gripping and romantic novel sure to captivate readers of At the Coffee Shop of Curiosities and The Change. Leeann Wu’s hands have started glowing at the most inconvenient times, and the single mother and midwife doesn’t know why. Could it be perimenopause? A hallucination brought on by a lack of sleep? On top of that concerning development, her daughter is off to university in a few months, her tenuous relationship with her ob-gyn mother is in peril of cracking, and she’s attracted the attention of a younger man who sees far more than she’s comfortable with. Her hands, glowing or not, are already full.
But as widespread insomnia plagues the town and life-threatening accidents begin to pile up, Leeann discovers the glow is not an anomaly at all—rather, she’s part of a long line of women who possess a power unlike anything Leeann’s ever known. Yet, even with the cryptic clues left by her great aunt before her untimely death, Leeann has no idea how to use her new skills.
With her town in imminent danger, Leeann doesn’t have time to waste. She’ll need to make peace with her magical heritage and do whatever it takes to find out if her glow means something more—before it’s too late.
Readers who loved Practical Magic will find lots to love in The Glowing Life of Leeann Wu.
Inception meets Indiana Jones in this cinematic, slow burn, romantasy following a headstrong academic and her equally stubborn bodyguard as they unearth an ancient secret that rocks the foundations of their society…and challenges their unspoken love for one another. A sapphic, dark academia-adjacent, climate dystopia—with mushrooms—for readers of Blood Over Bright Haven, How High We Go in the Dark, and Ink Blood Sister Scribe.
Kiana Strade can dive deeper into blood memories than anyone alive. But instead of devoting her talents to the temple she’s meant to lead, Key wants to do research for the Museum of Human Memory. . . and to avoid the public eye.
Valerian IV’s twin swords protect Key from murderous rivals and her own enthusiasm alike. Vale cares about Key as a friend—and maybe more—but most of all, she needs to keep her job so she can support her parents and siblings in the storm-torn south.
But when Key collects a memory that diverges from official history, only Vale sees the fallout. Key’s mentor suspiciously dismisses the finding; her powerful mother demands she stop research altogether. And Key, unusually affected by the memory, begins to lose moments, then minutes, then days.
As Vale becomes increasingly entangled in Key’s obsessive drive for answers, the women uncover a shattering discovery—and a devastating betrayal. Key and Vale can remain complicit, or they can jeopardize everything for the truth.
Either way, Key is becoming consumed by the past in more ways than one, and time is running out.
Joanna Lin is determined to avoid her mother’s matchmaking. With a new career as an art teacher at a Mandarin immersion school, Joanna refuses to let anything or anyone distract her. Especially her charming new colleague Jack Sun. His kindness and passion for teaching—not to mention those dimples!—are practically irresistible. But anything beyond friendship is impossible, especially when Jack’s moving to Taiwan at the end of the school year. But as spring—and the school’s Dragon Boat Festival—draws closer, love might send all of their careful plans tumbling overboard.
An Asian American coming-of-age novel set amongst social protests of the early 2010s in East Asia.
In 2014, a veteran of Occupy Wall Street, QQ arrives in Taiwan and finally finds what he’s been looking for in the Sunflower Movement – a grassroots campaign of militant young people that looks set to overthrow the existing government.
Setting up an online newspaper, Daybreak, to represent the movement to the outside world, QQ also battles with self-destructive, violent impulses that drive him to the frontlines of protests. His nihilistic streak is fed by those around him, a host of other citizens, activists and journalists who travel together through the depths of the Taiwanese night, when the ghosts of its repressive history loom large.
Will QQ manage to outrun his own self destructive impulses on the streets, or will the emptiness he feels eventually consume him? Will he find the connection he needs, or will V, the mysterious, destructive partner who haunts his dreams, claim him as her own? Will QQ be able to confront and survive his own family’s complicity in the era of the White Terror?
A unique blend or reportage, memoir and meditation on the unseen forces, personal and political, that propel people to the very edge, Taipei at Daybreak is a coming-of-age novel like no other, following tumultuous conflict both outside and in, and told through a spare style with flashes of dark poetry.
Where Are You Really From: Stories by Elaine Hsieh Chou
From the critically-acclaimed author of Disorientation, a multi-genre story collection that explores the limits and possibilities of storytelling
A mail order bride from Taiwan is packed up in a cardboard box and sent via express shipping to California, where her much older husband awaits her. Two teenage girls meticulously plan how to kill and cook their downstairs neighbor. An American au pair moves to Paris to find herself, only to find her actual French doppelgänger. A father reunites with his estranged daughter in unusual circumstances: as a background actor on the set of her film. A writer’s affair with a married artist tests the line between fact and fiction, self-victimization and the victimization of others.
In these six singular stories and a novella that pivot from the terrible to the beautiful to the surreal, Elaine Hsieh Chou confronts the slipperiness of truth in storytelling. With razor-sharp precision and psychological acuity, she peels back the tales we tell ourselves to peer beneath them: at our treacherous desires, our self-deceptions and our capacity for cruelty, both to ourselves and each other. Expansive and provocative, Where Are You Really From is a visionary achievement.
Winner of the Golden Comic Award, from traditional Peking Opera to Taiwan in a future where machine’s rule, enjoy this action-packed thriller in English for the first time.
From award-winning creator of Oldmen and The Hidden Level, Chang Sheng delivers an opulently detailed supernatural sci-fi story – that defies genres and engrosses readers with stunning artwork.
Winner of the Golden Comics Awards and a standout of Taiwan’s rising comics scene, Yan Vol. 1 is a haunting, genre-bending journey from master storyteller Chang Sheng—creator of Oldman and The Hidden Level.
In this stunning first volume, the echoes of Peking Opera performances 30 years past linger in the shadows of a story that begins in tradition and spirals toward a dark, speculative future. The tale unfolds across eras—starting with a tragedy in the richly detailed world of late 20th-century Taiwan, stepping into the present day, and glimmering with the foreboding rise of a dystopian tomorrow.
Declared dead in prison records, Yan Tieh-Hua mysteriously returns to Taipei, reigniting the investigation into a decades-old massacre—her own family’s. As she carves a bloody path toward vengeance, Detective Lei is drawn into a chilling spiral of cold cases, supernatural events, and impossible truths. Alongside Yan is Higa Mirai, a young Go prodigy with the uncanny gift of precognition, adding eerie weight to every move made.
With sharp moral tension, brutal action, and a uniquely Taiwanese swagger, Yan is more than a mere quest for revenge—it’s a vision of justice that questions what lies beneath our choices, and what might come after humanity loses control.
Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, translated by Lin King
Winner of the 2024 National Book Award for Translated Literature
May 1938. The young novelist Aoyama Chizuko has sailed from her home in Nagasaki, Japan, and arrived in Taiwan. She’s been invited there by the Japanese government ruling the island, though she has no interest in their official banquets or imperialist agenda. Instead, Chizuko longs to experience real island life and to taste as much of its authentic cuisine as her famously monstrous appetite can bear.
Soon a Taiwanese woman—who is younger even than she is, and who shares the characters of her name—is hired as her interpreter and makes her dreams come true. The charming, erudite, meticulous Chizuru arranges Chizuko’s travels all over the Land of the South and also proves to be an exceptional cook. Over scenic train rides and braised pork rice, lively banter and winter melon tea, Chizuko grows infatuated with her companion and intent on drawing her closer. But something causes Chizuru to keep her distance. It’s only after a heartbreaking separation that Chizuko begins to grasp what the “something” is.
Disguised as a translation of a rediscovered text by a Japanese writer, this novel was a sensation on its first publication in Mandarin Chinese in 2020 and won Taiwan’s highest literary honor, the Golden Tripod Award. Taiwan Travelogue unburies lost colonial histories and deftly reveals how power dynamics inflect our most intimate relationships.
ká-sióng,from the Taiwanese romanization of 假想, which means make-believe, imagine, hypothesise – derived from 假/ ká meaning ‘false’ and 想 ‘sióng’ meaning ‘thinking’, so ‘false thinking’ / imagination / hypothesis – is the latest series of new translations from Strangers Press.
This time out we are featuring writers and translators from Taiwan in a set of five thrillingly distinctive chapbooks expertly curated in partnership with series editor, Jeremy Tiang, and exquisitely designed with our customary flair. The perfect pick-me-up for the literary curious, each carefully selected story is full of piercing insight and intrigue.
“The flames of public fury burned so fiercely this time it seemed hell itself might engulf the mortal world.”
A by turns humorous, touching and harrowing story concerning Yu-Jie, a Social Media Manager for a local MP facing a PR disaster in the midst of a wave of social outrage stirred up by a troubling crime.
“This is in essence a cage without a door, the size of a single room… Clearly, you’ve resolved to run away; to keep running and running…”
Boy meets girl when both happen to arrive on the same rooftop, on the same day, to kill themselves. Instead, they chat and make a pact that sees their lives gradually entwine but unravel at the same time.
“Yasu stopped what she was doing and caught a glimpse of the wound as I rolled up my trousers to reveal the two purple-blue punctures on my right ankle. The knife in her hand slipped onto the cutting board and the clatter of metal hitting wood echoed through the kitchen.”
A chilling, gothic fable in which the narrator is bitten by a mountain rat while out in the forest. Recalling his grandfather once told him of a bamboo hut where members of the tribe could quarantine for up to two years when they got ill, he rushes home to say goodbye to his wife Yu-Su and pack his bags as a troubling sickness takes hold.
“The key is not to be misled by objects or ornaments that seem overtly symbolic, or pay too much attention to things in prominent locations… such decorations are just fragmented marginal sensory information and as such can’t be translated into coherent output.”
Set in an unspecified dystopian future in which people known as ‘Proxies’ are paid handsomely to remove negative emotions from their clients, Peacock, a successful Proxy, trains her son Sky to join the profession.
ká-sióng 5:
Socialby Lamulu Pakawyan/ tr. Colin Bramwell & Wen-chi Li
“Your body landed in a strange, theatrical posture beside the longan tree in front of your house. You were found, resuscitated, and sent to the intensive care unit. Your score on the Glasgow Coma Scale continues to drop.”
A woman has fallen off the roof of her house in what was either a drunken accident or an attempted suicide and now lies in a coma. Over the course of the next seven days, the unnamed narrator watches over her while tracking the comments the incident has attracted online.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the ninth and final interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: Homeseeking
Author: Karissa Chen
Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons (an imprint of Penguin Random House)
From WWII to 2008, this deeply moving story follows one couple across sixty years as world events pull them together and apart, illuminating the Chinese diaspora and exploring what it means to find home far from your homeland.
Haiwen is buying bananas at a 99 Ranch Market in Los Angeles when he looks up and sees Suchi, his Suchi, for the first time in sixty years. To recently widowed Haiwen it feels like a second chance, but Suchi has only survived by refusing to look back.
Suchi was seven when she first met Haiwen in their Shanghai neighborhood, drawn by the sound of his violin. Their childhood friendship blossomed into soul-deep love, but when Haiwen secretly enlisted in the Nationalist army in 1947 to save his brother from the draft, she was left with just his violin and a note: Forgive me.
Homeseeking follows the separated lovers through six decades of tumultuous Chinese history as war, famine, and opportunity take them separately to the song halls of Hong Kong, the military encampments of Taiwan, the bustling streets of New York, and sunny California, telling Haiwen’s story from the present to the past while tracing Suchi’s from her childhood to the present, meeting in the crucible of their lives. Throughout, Haiwen holds his memories close while Suchi forces herself to look only forward, neither losing sight of the home they hold in their hearts.
At once epic and intimate, Homeseeking is a story of family, sacrifice, and loyalty, and of the power of love to endure beyond distance, beyond time.
Interview with Karissa Chen
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: It’s really hard for me to pick a favorite Taiwanese food because so much of it is so good! I’ve written extensively before about my love for hot pot and for tea eggs, both foods that are very nostalgic and personal to me, as well as gua bao, which has always felt uniquely Taiwanese to me. I also think Taiwan does fried chicken better than anyone, beef noodle soup is the ultimate comfort food, a Din Tai Fung soup dumpling is definitely worth waiting in line for, and Taiwanese snow ice (the really fluffy kind) is like eating a perfect, sweet cloud. But weirdly enough right now (perhaps because summer is imminent) what I’m thinking about is the Irwin mango, called 愛文芒果 in Mandarin. It’s technically a mango species that originated in Florida, but I’d never encountered it until I moved to Taiwan, where its annual June arrival is celebrated. The flesh is impossibly soft and sweet, like taking a bite of ripe sunshine, with no pesky threads to catch in your teeth like the mangos I grew up eating in New Jersey. Oh man, there is no fruit in the world I love more. Plus, it’s kind of like me, a transplant from the States that has nonetheless acclimated and now thrives in Taiwan.
Q: Homeseeking spans six decades and features a forward-moving timeline and a backward-moving timeline that braid together and converge. Was it difficult to balance these two timelines and the scope they covered? What strategies did you employ to keep everything coherent, especially as you moved through different drafts and revisions?
A: I owe a debt of gratitude to Scrivener, a really powerful writing software that allows for different subfiles to exist within one project “binder”—as well as having some really cool features that made it easy for me to keep track of my research (including audio clips, images, and hyperlinks), scribble notes to myself on the side of each section, have a running checklist of tasks I needed to do, and maintain a version history that I could view, compare, and even roll back to. The fact that I could maintain separate files inside one draft folder meant that I could create blank files for each chapter I had to work on, move them around easily when I wanted to reorder things, and write in whatever order spoke to me.
In fact, when I first started the novel, I didn’t have this structure in mind. I had written random chapters from different years—a chapter from 2008, two from 1965 from two different points of view, a chapter from 1935 (that ultimately didn’t make the final novel)—and I was trying to figure out how they pieced together, what the shape of my story was. But once I landed upon this structure, it became a lot easier for me to see what moments needed to be covered, and how the story would fit together. Weirdly enough, keeping track of these timelines was the least stressful aspect of writing the book because of how easy Scrivener made it! (I am not being paid to say this, haha, I just really love Scrivener!)
Q: Although Homeseeking isn’t “about” politics or history, the political and historical events of the times and places Suchi and Haiwen lived in inevitably shaped their experiences intimately. How did you go about managing the tension between the powerful social forces at play and the individual wills of the characters?
A: This is such a great question. What I’m really interested in is the ways that big historical and political events affect individuals on an intimate level. When we read about a statistical figure on people killed in a war or people displaced, we don’t hear the stories behind the numbers. But in fact, there are so many heartbreaks and tiny choices that were made (or not made) that led these individuals to become the numbers we see. I felt keenly aware that Haiwen and Suchi were representatives of a time and place they lived in—and in fact, I wanted to get their circumstances right so that a reader might think, “This happened not just to these fictional people but to millions of real, actual humans too,”—and yet, at the same time, in order to write good fiction, the characters must exist as their own people too, not just act as empty caricatures. This meant that I had to know who they were, intimately, that I had to understand what made them tick, how they saw the world, what their hopes and dreams were. Only then could I imagine the choices they would make in the face of impossible situations. Hopefully, it’s through the lens of seeing these characters and the situations they faced that lets a reader feel both the weight of history and imagine the way a story might unfurl differently for different people.
Q: Unlike real people, fictional characters and events generally have to justify their existence from a narrative perspective. Haiwen and Suchi’s family members are people in their lives but they are also narrative foils and pieces of a mosaic showing the different ways people respond to the same or similar events and traumas. Were there any major characters that were added or deleted from the story between the first draft and the final draft? Did you ever struggle with managing all the moving parts of the story and the complex web of relationships between the characters?
A: There were a bunch of minor characters that I did take out or combine into individuals, but no, the core characters in the book had presented themselves to me from the beginning. For me, writing fiction is discovery—I don’t do character sketches beforehand or do much outlining at the outset, so I’m learning about the world of the characters as I go along. Once I find out through the act of writing that, for instance, Suchi has a sister, she becomes very real to me, and then of course, she naturally becomes an integral part of the world and story. I write with the awareness she exists and as if she’s an essential part of Suchi’s story, the same way I write with the awareness that I’m writing a story set in Shanghai or a world where cell phones exist but smart phones are only barely on the periphery. I think because the people become so real to me, I don’t struggle much in managing them in my mind, the same way I don’t struggle with remembering my immediate family and good friends and my relationships to them.
Q: You obviously did a lot of research into the history behind the story, but I’m curious—were there were other activities you did to immerse yourself in the world of the characters and feel out the details and nuances of their lives?
A: One of the biggest things I felt I had to learn more about was the violin portion of the story—I’m not a violinist though I do love music—classical music in particular—very much. I watched a lot of videos of violinists playing and interviews with violinists—I particularly binged a lot of TwoSet Violin’s videos (they are two Taiwanese Australian violinists who make YouTube comedy videos about classical music and performance). I really wanted to understand what it looked like to play the violin, how it felt. I also watched a lot of period movies and listened to shidaiqu and classical music a lot, just to flood my senses with the sounds and sights of different periods so I could accurately capture what those times felt like.
This wasn’t an intentional part of my writing process, but I did take erhu lessons for about three months (not very long, I know, but I felt like I had to stop torturing my neighbors!). It was an instrument I had always admired and wanted to learn. I had never played a bowed instrument before (I had flute, piano, and voice lessons growing up) and I found it really challenging! It was just a short stint, but it did help me have a better tactile understanding of what it took to play a bowed instrument, even if it wasn’t violin.
Q: Do you consider yourself someone who overwrites or underwrites, or does it depend on the type of scene or story? How do you cultivate your sense of how much is “enough” detail and which details are most “necessary” within a scene or story?
A: Ahahaha, I am definitely an overwriter. How else do you think I ended up with a 500-page book? In all seriousness though, I think once my brain accepts that I’m writing a novel, the freedom of that long empty expanse gives me the permission to write as much as I want. I’m often (though not always) a visual writer, in that, I imagine a scene with specific clarity, and I’m always trying to get down exactly what I see, because I want the reader to experience it in their imaginations exactly the way I do. This means that I expend a lot of words trying to fully capture something that is impossible to capture purely with words. This is also the same way I feel about trying to capture an emotion, an ambience, etc. In grad school, one of my professors pointed out to me that I would try to use three metaphors in an attempt to really elucidate one particular feeling, when it would obviously be best to choose one. From that, I learned that part of my process is actively working out what I’m trying to get at by overwriting, and once I’ve thrown everything onto the page, I can cull it and make it more precise. (In fact, even in writing this answer, I wrote a bunch of examples and thoughts and went back in and cut and curated to be a bit less redundant!)
Funnily enough, the other form I’m really drawn to is flash fiction, which requires an economy of language, but which feels like an entirely different writing experience for me. When I sit down to write flash fiction, I’m often driven by mood or by language, and thus I pay particular attention to the necessity and weight of each word from the very first draft, in a way I don’t think about at all when I’m first drafting a longer piece.
Q: One of the threads running throughout the story that stood out to me was the different ways women, especially mothers, weathered the events of history in contrast to the men, due to the patriarchal society they lived in. Moreover, in my experience, when discussing the history of 19th and 20th century Chinese immigration and diaspora, there is a tendency for narratives to focus on the men more so than the women, in part because many of the larger migrations involved men migrating alone, as bachelors or as husbands/fathers leaving behind wives/children. Did you come across such gaps in the literature when you were researching? How did you strike a balance between reflecting and acknowledging the misogyny of the setting and pushing back against the marginalization of women from a narrative perspective?
A: This is a great question. One of the things I found challenging was to imagine Suchi as a teenager and the possibilities for her future, because I actually wasn’t quite sure *what* kind of future would have been available to her, what the expected path for a typical middle-class woman in Shanghai would have been. In fact, it was my editor who pointed this gap out to me, because at first I thought perhaps Suchi (or at least her father) would want her to go to university, but my editor and I discussed it and we thought, Would that have been a path that would have been available to her given her family’s financial situation?
I read a few memoirs by young women who had lived in Shanghai at the time (who had later escaped China) but they were upper class young ladies who went to good universities and were expected to run in the upper echelons of Shanghai society. I turned to the writer Eileen Chang a few times, to get a sense of what her characters were like, though they were often just a little bit older than Suchi would have been, enough that I wondered if the opportunities and expectations might still have been a little bit different. I did end up asking some historians and folks who had more knowledge than me about the kind of jobs women back then held, etc. as well as poring over academic articles.
In the end, I wrote a synthesis of what I had read about in my research as well as giving her some of my modern sensibilities as a woman to long for something greater than what was on the table for her. I think in part, what is great about fiction is that I have more room to take some license. How common were fathers like Suchi and Sulan’s father? I don’t know. But I’d like to hope and think that there might have been a couple of progressive-leaning men at the time who were fumbling towards bridging the gender gap, however imperfect it might have been. And if I allowed for that space, that meant that I could give Suchi and Sulan free rein to dream for themselves as well. In doing so, I could highlight the ways in which society at large still stifled women like them. The great thing about fiction is that there’s room to paint in the gaps that history leaves out. I didn’t think it was improbable that there were women with all kinds of dreams or living out all kinds of lives that didn’t fit a traditional stereotype of what we might imagine; to me, making space for it in fiction was just a way to acknowledge that.
Q: You mentioned in another interview that you’re the type who likes to go to Wikipedia after watching a movie. During your research for Homeseeking, did you ever go down rabbit holes (on Wikipedia or otherwise) that you had to abandon because the information you found wasn’t serving this particular story, but that you want to return to for a different story in the future? If so, can you share a few?
A: Yes! This happened all the time. One light-hearted example is that one time, when thinking about a particular bar scene, I wanted Haiwen to order a beer. I started wondering what brand of beer he would order, what would have been available in Hong Kong in the mid-60s. I went down an entire rabbit hole for an hour or more until I had to stop myself and realize that this was not an important detail at all. In the book, Haiwen orders a whiskey instead.
A more serious rabbit hole I went down was that I had actually wanted to write an entire chapter about what happened to Suchi’s parents. I spent an entire month at a residency working on this, thinking about the period of time when they disappeared, imagining what happened to them. This led me to researching the Great Famine, first on the internet, and then buying and reading an entire book about it (the stunning and very upsetting Tombstone by Yang Jisheng). I was so immersed in this specific incident in history that I was dreaming about it and the chapter I wrote wrung me, utterly. In the end, when I was going over the novel, I had to concede that the chapter didn’t fit in the book—it was too different in tone and material, and for narrative reasons, it didn’t make sense to keep in the novel. Still, it remains a piece of writing I am proud of and I hope I’ll be able to publish it elsewhere, someday.
Karissa Chen is a Fulbright fellow, Kundiman Fiction fellow, and a VONA/Voices fellow whose fiction and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, Eater, The Cut, NBC News THINK!, Longreads, PEN America, Catapult, Gulf Coast, and Guernica, among others. She was awarded an artist fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts as well as multiple writing residencies including at Millay Arts, where she was a Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation Creative Fellow and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, among others. She was formerly a senior fiction editor at The Rumpus and currently serves as the editor-in-chief at Hyphen magazine. She received an MFA in fiction from Sarah Lawrence College and splits her time between New Jersey and Taipei, Taiwan.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the eighth interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: Gorgeous Gruesome Faces
Author: Linda Cheng
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press (an imprint of Macmillan Publishers)
Two years have passed since Sunny Lee lost her best friend Mina in a mysterious death. With their other BFF, Candie, the trio had been the hottest up-and-coming teen pop group, until it all suddenly ended. And Sunny can’t help but wonder if Candie had something to do with it.
Now, Sunny is still seeking answers. When she discovers that Candie is attending a new K-pop workshop, Sunny follows, hoping to uncover the reason why Mina died… and why she died so violently. Sunny and Candie’s reunion is haunted by more than Mina’s death as the old spark between them returns, even stronger than before. But there’s no time for romance when the lines between nightmare and reality start to blur, leaving their competitors’ bodies bizarrely maimed and mutilated. To survive, Sunny must expose the dark secrets surrounding Candie and the workshop’s twisted promise for fame.
Stitched with cutting commentary on the ugly side of stardom and impossible beauty standards, Linda Cheng’s mind-bending, feminist thriller will have readers screaming and swooning for more.
Interview with Linda Cheng
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: Oh my gosh picking favorites is so hard, but I’m going to go with the specialty of my hometown of Changhua: bawan (crystal meatballs).
Q: You mentioned in a previous interview that through the course of your writing journey, you wound up in a “love affair” with horror as a genre. What do you love about horror as a genre, and what kinds of themes surrounding fear and/or haunting were you aiming to express with Gorgeous Gruesome Faces?
A: For me, horror is both cathartic and comforting; I enjoy constructing my own haunted house, furnishing it with monsters, and using it to explore my fears. It’s a safe and controlled environment to dive into dark themes. As a genre it’s one of the most creative and imaginative, where some of the most transgressive queer storytelling is happening. Horror is also just a fun adrenaline rush!
Gorgeous Gruesome Faces was written during the pandemic, and at its core it is a deeply personal exploration of grief, losing loved ones, and being haunted by the (sometimes literal) ghosts of your past mistakes.
Q: One of the prominent themes in the story that stood out to me in this book is the connections between parasocial relationships, objectification, and consumption of idols. Do you see that kind of dynamic play out in your life as an author who functions as a bit of a public figure, and how do you navigate the pressures that come with that kind of visibility when you approach creating your stories?
A: I definitely see this playing out in the author space. Writers are encouraged to be highly visible and active on social media and to engage directly with the audience while often times putting their personal life on display. Not everyone feels comfortable doing this, yet at the same time it feels required of us. I have a very fraught relationship with social media and I’m honestly still working on finding the right balance between having a visible public presence, staying connected with my readers, while also protecting my privacy.
Q: Somewhat related to the previous question, but Gorgeous Gruesome Faces touches on the real-world pressures of Asian American entertainers to be role models who “represent” the community due to the general lack of visibility of Asian Americans in mainstream media. Similarly, in the YA publishing space, queer Asian/Asian diaspora stories are still a relatively small minority, so it’s easy to get caught in the trap of feeling like the queer Asian characters have to be paragons of virtue, even though ironically, that ends up reinforcing a one-dimensional view of marginalized people because it erases their human flaws. How do you see your stories in relation to these dynamics, and what helps keep you grounded in your artistic visions for your queer Asian stories, especially as a queer creator yourself?
A: The question of what constitutes “good representation” in a piece of media is addressed directly in my book, and it is in fact inspired by the discussions I’ve seen over the years in the YA publishing space. I definitely struggled with this during the writing process, plagued with worry and self-doubt about how the story and characters would be graded on the representation scale. In the end, I had to remind myself that I can only create what feels true and authentic to me, and is reflective of my own, singular, experience. I don’t have any interest in writing “perfect” queer characters who are meant to be role models. The process of growing up and finding your identity is messy and complicated, and my hope is to show young queer people through my characters that it is okay not to get it right, it is okay to make huge mistakes and be deeply flawed.
Q: Every genre comes with a set of associated tropes that can mediate readers’ expectations in various directions but also run the risk of creating a story that’s overly formulaic if the execution isn’t handled well. How do you strike the balance between employing the familiar tropes of the horror genre and infusing your work with sensibilities that your own original formulations?
A: I absolutely love subverting tropes and playing with expectations, so when utilizing any type of well-known trope in my books, I always try to add a new spin to it, adding something unexpected. I love genre-bending as well, and my stories don’t neatly fit into one genre or the other. Gorgeous Gruesome Faces is as much a romance as it is horror, and so I was able to draw tropes from both genres and mix and match them to create something wholly new and wholly mine.
Q: Every so often I’ll see posts about the phenomenon of aphantasia and the spectrum of what people visualize in their heads go viral, and I was wondering where you fit in on the spectrum, especially when it comes to visualizing your own stories. Horror is a genre that is generally very attuned to sensory details as anchors for the mood or cues that something is “off,” so I feel like capturing those things in writing is a critical part of the craft. Do you see your scenes play out like a movie in your head, or is it more vaguely defined? Do you find any one of your senses to be weaker, and are there any strategies you employ to help with visualization or immersing yourself in and conjuring up the sensory experiences you’re constructing?
A: I went to school for visual arts and I am definitely someone who pictures the scenes visually in my mind as I’m writing. Often times when drafting I will envision myself holding a camera as I move through the scene, and it helps to stimulate my senses as I am trying to describe the details of a scene. My sense of smell is not the best, but I really enjoy describing foul smells! A common strategy for me is listening to mood-setting music, that really helps me become immersed in a scene I’m writing.
Q: I do not think of myself as a big horror lover in general, but in recent years I’ve come to appreciate the genre a lot more and have started exploring more. Are there any recommendations for books, films, or shows you would recommend to people who want to broaden their knowledge of the genre (bonus if they’re queer or Taiwanese)? (Doesn’t have to be anything considered “canon” or a “classic,” feel free to indulge your own personal preferences.)
A: For film, I recommend the Taiwanese folk horror movie Incantation. I’m a huge horror movie junkie and don’t scare easily, but that one got me good! For books I recommend The Dark becomes Her by Judy I. Lin, which features Taiwanese-Canadian diaspora and is set in Vancouver’s Chinatown! For horror game players, I also highly recommend the Taiwanese horror game Devotion.
Q: Beautiful Brutal Bodies, the follow-up to Gorgeous Gruesome Faces, comes out this fall. Can you share more about this new book? How was writing it different from writing your debut?
A: Sophomore books are notoriously challenging to write, and not only was Beautiful Brutal Bodies the second book in a duology, it also is the second book I’ve ever written, so the process was definitely difficult, especially having to write on deadline. The book went through several drafts, major rewrites, and big revisions as I scrambled to nail down the story without having the “unlimited time” I did when I was drafting my first book. But I’m very proud of this story and I’m so excited to share Beautiful Brutal Bodies with everyone this fall. It is a companion sequel set in the same world as Gorgeous Gruesome Faces, and while it boasts a new cast and can be read as a standalone, readers should be on the lookout for familiar faces from book 1! Beautiful Brutal Bodies follows reclusive songstress Tian and her childhood friend turned bodyguard Liya, as the two attend a spiritual healing retreat on a cursed island that descends into a bloody nightmare, featuring Chinese folk horror, monster bodyguards, and a story-within-a-story dark fairytale. It goes on sale November 4th and is available for pre-order now!
Linda Cheng was born in Taiwan and spent her childhood moving between cultures and continents. She received her BFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design, and worked as an art director across South Carolina and Georgia where she developed a deep love for sweet tea, grits, and Southern Gothic stories. She currently resides in Vancouver, Canada with her family. Gorgeous Gruesome Faces is her debut novel.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the seventh interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology
Author: Angela Hsieh
Publisher: Quill Tree Books (an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers)
Release Date: May 27, 2025
Genre/Format: Middle Grade Fantasy Graphic Novel
Synopsis
Perfect for fans of Studio Ghibli and The Tea Dragon Society, this beautiful graphic novel follows a girl who learns more about friendship and family as she journeys across the fantastical land of Lirrin to tend to its majestic animals.
Lu dreams of being a great adventurer, just like her ah-ma, who is a world-renowned geozoologist. Ah-ma has traveled far and wide, researching unique animals like dreamy cloud-jellies, enormous sunfish, and playful mossgoats. There’s nothing Lu loves more than reading Ah-ma’s letters about her quests, even if she and her mom struggle to understand the Cylian language Ah-ma writes in.
But when Ah-ma’s letters suddenly stop, Lu becomes worried. So when a nearby town needs a geozoologist, Lu decides to go on the journey to find Ah-ma. She charts a course with the help of Ren, an old friend turned new travel buddy.
As they follow in Ah-ma’s footsteps, Lu begins to discover the complex relationships between geofauna—and between people. What stories has Ah-ma never told her? And what’s Ren hiding from her?
Interview with Angela Hsieh
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: My grandma makes these incredible zongzi (rice dumplings). They’re packed with fatty pork and savory sticky rice. I’ve long associated her zongzi with visiting family in Taiwan, or when my grandma would come to the States to visit us. She doesn’t cook much anymore, but while visiting her earlier this year, I asked her to teach me how to make her zongzi. Now I have to practice making them so mine might one day taste as good as hers!
Another food that fills my belly and my soul without having to travel to the other side of the world: my mom’s braised oxtail and tomato-and-egg stir fry. I always request it when I visit home.
Q: What sparked the idea for Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology? Was the first thing that came to you a character, a scenario, an element of the worldbuilding, etc.?
A: I have a friend who loves guinea pigs. For her birthday—back in 2017, I think—I drew her a gigantic mountain-sized guinea pig with a tiny figure climbing up its back. To go with the illustration, I wrote a national parks postcard-style description of this place, as if it were a real mountain range you could visit.
It was a hit. There’s nothing more motivating than delighting a friend with a thing you made for them.
Not too long after, I submitted the mountainous guinea pig illustration to a gallery show. An art director at a major publisher saw it, contacted me, and asked if I had plans to write a story set in this world. To which the only response could be: yeah, of course I do! Which meant that I suddenly had to write that story. I didn’t end up working with that art director, but if she hadn’t reached out to me, I might not have seriously considered turning that germ of an idea into a book.
Q: On your website you mention you’ve worked in zoos and wildlife centers. Can you share a little more about those experiences and how they’ve influenced your work as an artist?
A: It really makes for a great conversation starter, doesn’t it? There were always nature documentaries playing on the TV in the house where I grew up, and I’d check out animal-related books from the school library nearly every week. I was actually a biology major before I even considered art as a career. I went far down the pre-med/pre-veterinary track, with a strong preference for the latter, hence the zoo and wildlife center internships. I once scruffed four raccoons at once (wildlife center), vaccinated a bison (zoo), firefighter-carried a sedated bear cub to a new enclosure (wildlife center), and assisted during a surgery on a wallaby (zoo), to name a few highlights.
While nobody is scruffing rock-raccoons in Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology, my love for animals and the natural world is still pretty obvious throughout the book. It goes beyond just liking to draw animals (which I very much like to do). Some of the plot points in Geozoology are heavily inspired by things I learned in life science class, like hydrangea flowers changing color depending on soil acidity, and the havoc that introducing species to new environments can create. Nature is cool. I want to share how cool it is with everyone.
Q: In the story, Lu and Ren’s families speak Cylian, a language analogous to Mandarin Chinese in our world, but can’t read it very well. There are on-page depictions of the written language as well, and I found these to be a bit uncanny since they resemble written Chinese but aren’t real Chinese characters. Did you have a systematic approach to designing these fake Chinese characters for the Cylian script?
A: I’m so glad you asked this question because it means I get to nerd out about one of my favorite works of installation art: Xu Bing’s A Book from the Sky.
I came across A Book from the Sky over a decade ago. Xu Bing created pages upon pages of glyphs made to resemble Chinese, but changed in such a way to become meaningless. He then laid out rows upon rows of these pages full of nonsense characters across the floor, covered the walls with them, and hung them like drapes from the ceiling. When I saw it, it felt like someone holding a light up to something I’d been trying to express for a very long time. Here was a work of art that I could show a native reader and say: this is how I feel when I look at a page, when I’m trying to decipher a text message, when I’m walking down the street in Taipei. I’ve met them before. I grew up next to them. I should understand. But the more I try to grasp at the edges of comprehension, the more it slips through my fingers.
When I set out to create Cylian, I wanted to capture that feeling for the reader—even one who can read Chinese. I did briefly consider using real Chinese, but I quickly decided I would not. First, because I simply wouldn’t be able to, with my skill level being what it is. Second, I wanted all readers to be unable to understand Shan’s letters, just like Lu cannot.
At this point in my life, despite a valiant effort at Chinese school in my youth, my Chinese writing and reading comprehension can be generously described as “at a first-grade level.” Even so, my hand still remembers the act of writing characters. I know the order of brushstrokes. The forms feel familiar. What this means is that I can fake writing Chinese in a way that’s almost believable. It was less about systematic language construction and more about capturing that feeling of being soclose to understanding, yet still a world away.
As far as I’m aware, my interpretation of A Book from the Sky through a diaspora lens is not exactly what Xu Bing intended. But the beauty of such things is that I could carry with me the way that a fine art installation made me feel for a decade or more, and that it could become one of the seeds for a middle grade fantasy graphic novel about the language barrier between a girl and her grandmother.
Q: You wear various different hats as an artist, doing editorial illustration, nonfiction book illustration, comics, etc. Does your approach to your art change depending on the medium/context, or do you have a unified philosophy and process regardless?
A: Shifting my approach with each project keeps things interesting. I’ve always been something of a jack-of-all-trades, in part because I feel stagnant if I don’t switch things up every once in a while. The quick turnarounds in editorial keep me on my toes. Comics and graphic novels let me explore themes in depth in a way I wouldn’t be able to in a single illustration.
Editorial tends to deal with making the more abstract or conceptual concrete. Nonfiction book illustration for kids is concerned with making information accurate, yet interesting and accessible. Comics can encompass all of those things and more. They’re very open-ended. I find comics the most challenging—and frustrating!—of the lot because of that potential. I end up having to let ideas sit in the back of my head and marinate while I get on with other projects. I need to give the flavors time to combine.
In each of these forms, however, the goal is communication. In that way, I have a unified philosophy in all my artistic work, even if the approaches might differ.
Q: Creating 240 pages of full-color graphic novel is a lot of work. What was the hardest part of this whole process? Are there any particular pages, spreads, or panels that you’re extra proud of, or that are your favorites?
A: The part where I struggled the most was starting each page after finishing the previous one. It’s disheartening to close a beautiful, polished page and then open up a document of wiggly blue lines haphazardly silly-stringed across a flat white background. And then you realize you have to do this, oh, 216 more times before you’re done with this thing. It got better when I got past the halfway mark, though. I fell into a rhythm that carried me through to the end.
Visually, my favorite pages are the spreads. I hope the reader feels a sense of awe when they turn the page to see cloud-jellies stretched across the sky, or the herd of cavioliths Lu and Ren have been searching for.
A writing moment that I’m really proud of is a scene about halfway through the book when Lu gets into an argument with a shopkeeper. Writing that scene was one of those moments when Lu’s character really came to life for me. I cherish that moment of sudden clarity when I realized that this girl gets pedantic when she’s mad. Now that feels like a real person to me—and maybe a little too close to home, hah!
Q: As big as the world is in Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology, it seems like there is room for more stories and adventures. Do you have any plans for a sequel or spin-off set in this world? If not, what’s next in your book-making journey?
A: Frankly, after spending over four years making this book, I’m ready to do something different for a while! I don’t have a sequel planned. I don’t want to force myself to write one, either; if I made myself write something my heart isn’t into, I think it would show, and not in a good way. However, if the right idea comes at the right time, I’m open to making another book set in the world of Geozoology.
I have another middle grade graphic novel with HarperCollins in the works, but I’m not quite ready to talk about it yet. I’ll reveal more when the time comes!
Angela Hsieh is a Taiwanese American author and illustrator whose choices are mostly explained by her love of goofy animals. Her life experiences include fireman-carrying a sedated bear cub and catching a belligerent wallaby. She has 1.5 cats.
She illustrated Antarctica: The Melting Continent, a critically acclaimed nonfiction book about real-life scientists and explorers. Lu and Ren’s Guide to Geozoology is her first graphic novel.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the sixth interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
On the eastern plains of Taiwan, a young girl and her mother pick wild greens before a rainstorm drenches them and their garden. When she goes to pull at the roots of a spiky, stalky weed, she learns that the plant is not what it seems. A lyrical story that shows young readers how to appreciate the bounty of nature and the beauty of identity.
Chinese and Pinyin translations are included in pages and backmatter features additional information on the indigenous Amis people of Taiwan.
Interview with Erica Lee Schlaikjer
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: Anything my mother cooks! In March, I gave birth to my first child, and my mother flew out from Maryland to be with us in California, to help me zuo yue zi 坐月子—literally, “sitting the moon”—a Chinese postpartum confinement practice where new mothers rest and recover for 40 days after childbirth. Every day for a month she made me nourishing soups, broths, stews and other nutritious meals. From now on, I’ll always associate sweet potato millet porridge with the coziness of “home.”
When it comes to Taiwanese food, I’m a sucker for zongzi (粽子)—I guess they’re like Taiwanese tamales? And I get specific cravings for things I ate while studying and working in Taipei for a few months way back in 2008. For example, every morning for breakfast, I’d stop by the Yong He Dou Jiang (永和豆漿) fast food eatery and get some warm soy milk and a taro pastry (yu tou su 芋頭酥) on my way to class. When I wanted something savory, my uncle would treat me to braised pork over rice (lu rou fan 滷肉飯) at some local street vendor.
Q: Back in 2021 I wrote a lengthy blog post about the history of diaspora/Anglophone Taiwanese children’s literature where I also identified some of the gaps I saw, which included, among many other things, Indigenous representation and bilingual books. Now, about 4 years later, Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl 野菜姑娘 has come along to begin filling some of those gaps. I believe it’s the first traditionally published “Own Voices” children’s book by an Indigenous Taiwanese author in the Anglophone market, and as far as I am aware, you are also the first author with Indigenous heritage I’ve interviewed for this Taiwanese American Heritage Week author interview series. As you mentioned in your interview with Taiwanese American dot Org, Taiwanese American identity tends to be associated with people of Han Chinese descent first and foremost. This was something I was not as conscious of and mostly took for granted when I was a kid, coming from a Hoklo Taiwanese background, but as an adult, after deepening my own political education on Taiwan, I have learned to unpack and critically engage with that aspect of “Taiwaneseness.” I’m curious as to what your own journey to understanding and contextualizing your own identity as Amis looked like. Did that inform how you approached writing Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl?
A: Thanks for writing that blog post. It’s the most thorough and well-researched piece of writing I’ve seen that specifically analyzes Taiwanese cultural representation in English-centric children’s literature.
When it comes to my identity, I’ve always understood myself simply as the daughter of my two parents: a white American father, and an aboriginal Taiwanese mother. I find it’s easier to just tell people who I come from, rather than where I come from. There is no singular term that adequately defines my origins—and not just because I’m mixed race. “American” is a nationality, not an ethnicity. In the U.S., “Asian American” tends to describe second- or third-generation children of immigrants from mostly East Asia (despite Asia being so much more than that.) I find that “Taiwanese” obscures my indigenous roots because it is too often associated with people of only Han-Chinese descent. “Amis,” unfortunately, doesn’t usually have any meaning to people outside of Taiwan. And “Austronesian” typically refers to a widely dispersed language family, not necessarily an ethnicity.
The more I learn about Taiwan’s aboriginal peoples, the less I even consider myself “Asian.” If there is a box to check, I usually select “Pacific Islander,” but I know many folks from Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia don’t include Taiwan as part of their island community.
I tried to unpack all of that cultural and geographic baggage in the book’s backmatter—no easy feat, in under 300 words. It was a challenge to describe “colonization” using the vocabulary for an 8-year-old!
Ultimately, I wrote my children’s book because it’s the story of my heart—an ethnically ambiguous, half-Amis girl, who grew up in big cities, trying to learn more about her native roots, through her mother’s language and the natural world around them. The island itself is a character in the story: the clouds “groan,” the sky “cries,” and plants have their own spirit. I wanted to honor the land, which is sacred, especially when you consider a history of Taiwan’s indigenous people fighting for their land rights, autonomy, and recognition of ancestral homelands. Taiwan is very much an intentional setting for the book because it is a unique place with its own special identity. Like I emphasized to my publicist and editor: this is not a bilingual English-Chinese book about China, as some might assume; it’s about Taiwan.
There’s a line in the story that I hope makes all Taiwanese people proud: “Visitors tell me it looks like the coasts of Hawaii, or the bluffs of California, or the shores of New Zealand. I tell them it looks exactly like itself: Taiwan, the beautiful island, where the mountains meet the sea.”
Although the story is specific to me and my people, I hope it resonates with everyone for its universal themes of seeking belonging, preserving culture and heritage, and respecting nature.
Q: I noticed while researching the information about the book for this interview that the translator for the book, Shan Li Bannai Serasis, is also Amis, and is in fact your cousin, which I think is pretty special! Since the picturebook creation process in general is often compartmentalized, where the author and illustrator (when they’re not the same person) may not even communicate directly but instead work separately with the editor as the liaison, I was wondering what that experience was like having a family member as one of the co-creators of this book.
A: I have to shout out Sleeping Bear Press for taking a creative risk with my manuscript! I originally submitted it in English only, and once it got acquired, I pushed for it to be translated into Mandarin. I know so many kids and families who crave books written in multiple languages, as a learning tool. I suggested we keep it in the family, so to speak, and hire my cousin Bannai (my mother’s brother’s daughter), who happens to be a professional English-Chinese language tutor, and like me, also knows a few phrases in Amis.
It was both fun and humbling to collaborate with my cousin. I knew we were creating something special for our family—for our elders and also our future generations—so it felt like a big responsibility. Amis is a vulnerable language, with fewer native speakers in each passing generation, so it felt significant to capture even just a few words on the page. As for the proper pronunciation of Amis words, I consulted my mother, Bannai consulted her father, and we used a mix of pinyin and English spellings to phoneticize the words as best as we could, although I’m sure there is an Amis language scholar out there who would “correct” our choices. Amis, in reality, is an oral language, so I figured we could take some creative liberties with the text.
Bannai and I had a good laugh at some of my clumsy attempts at the Chinese translation. For example, the way I translated “When I was little, my hands were too small and clumsy to be useful” turned out to be more like “When I was little, my hands were useless” 《我小時候， 我的手沒有用》which sounds harsh! I thought I was more fluent than I am. Surprisingly, in some instances, my limited Chinese vocabulary actually helped guide Bannai to simplify some of her translations of the text, which initially sounded too advanced for young readers. That’s the beauty of writing picture books: it forces you to get to the essence of things. The way kids think and talk is poetic.
Q: In that same interview I mentioned earlier, you commented on the irony of publishing a story in a written medium while hailing from a culture that has historically transmitted knowledge through oral traditions. Have you considered making an audiobook version of Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl? I’m guessing finding an experienced audiobook narrator with the linguistic competencies to handle all three languages that are used would be difficult, but I think it would be lovely to have that.
A: Yes, I’d love to have an audiobook version! Bannai or myself could easily do it. I did have a few readers ask me how to pronounce some of the Amis words, so I recorded a video with my mom to capture the audio for social media. It would be cool to have a magic wand, like the Habbi Habbi books, that teaches you how to say unfamiliar words out loud when you wave it over the text.
Q: Toward the end of the book, there’s a spread that talks about how most people in Taiwan don’t tend to wild gardens or grow their own food anymore, instead buying their food in mass produced packaged forms. Taiwan is often praised by both locals and visitors for its convenience (because who doesn’t love Taiwanese 7-Elevens?), but in recent years I’ve started thinking about how convenience may at times be at odds with environmental sustainability. It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot in the context of the U.S. as well, given how so much of our food production is controlled by a handful of massive corporations that engage in unethical and ecologically extractive processes on a large scale. As a result, reading those pages felt like a moment of reckoning for me personally. These kinds of practices can’t be divorced from the erosion of Indigenous ways of life, so I’m wondering what your thoughts are on the issue.
A: In a capitalist society, everything is a commodity to be bought and sold, not replenished or renewed. Convenience definitely clashes with environmental sustainability. It prioritizes speed and disposability, instead of longevity and reciprocity. We live in such a wasteful, consumerist world, disconnected from our natural food sources. We’re so often blind to the labor and extraction that underpins everything we consume.
I have loved living in bustling modern cities, but there is always a part of me that yearns to escape. I guess my picture book is a glimpse into my fantasy where I have a more reciprocal relationship with land, tending to a wild garden to sustain myself. And it really is a fantasy. Even my mother grew up disconnected from “indigenous ways of life,” living in the city of Taitung. Sure, her parents made a living by fishing and growing rice, but a lot of their indigenous knowledge was also stolen and disfigured by systems of oppression (racism, colonialism, capitalism.)
Q: Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl tells the story of a mother-daughter relationship, emphasizing and paying tribute to the importance of intergenerational dialogue and matrilineal inheritance in Amis culture. Now that you are newly a mother yourself, would you say your perspective on storytelling has shifted?
A: It’s a lovely coincidence that all three creators of Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl created new life while our book was in development: Cinyee (our illustrator) and Bannai (our translator) both gave birth to daughters, and I got pregnant with my son! My baby is only 6 weeks old, so time will tell how he influences my creative process.
A lot of people assume that all children’s book authors and illustrators are parents, but that’s not necessarily true. I think we are all just really tapped into our inner child. Now that I am a mother, though, I’m excited to see the world through my son’s eyes. He, too, is mixed-race (his father is Palestinian) and I love to think about what it will mean to raise a “Taiwastinian” child, who will hopefully read books in English, Arabic, and Mandarin, and who will have a deep reverence for nature and indigenous cultures worldwide. He will surely inspire me to tell new stories that I wouldn’t have imagined without him.
My debut picture book really feels like a gift to my mother—my way of showing her how much I treasure our Amis identity. My future books will be gifts to my son—an heirloom to leave behind after I’m gone.
Q: You mentioned before that you grew without much of a connection to your Amis heritage. Did the process of writing Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl act as a stepping stone for reconnecting? Are there other aspects of Amis culture you’d like to highlight in future books?
A: To be clear, I’ve always been very proud to be Amis, but there have been many reasons why I haven’t been able to fully embody my heritage: because of a history of colonization that fractured my relatives’ relationship to their own history, culture, and language; because I don’t know many other people besides my own family who are Amis; because I personally haven’t spent much time in Taiwan; because I’m half-white; because I live in America.
Writing the picture book definitely motivated me to ask my mother more questions, starting with the basics: “How do you count to 10?” She taught me a few other Amis vocabulary words, too, which I included in the final text.
I’d love to highlight more about our Amis culture in future works, especially our traditions of song and dance, which often coincide with agricultural rituals and festivals. I wish I could write more about Amis folklore and spirituality, especially considering my grandfather was known as a village shaman or fortune-teller of sorts. But a lot of that knowledge has been lost through the generations. I asked my mother what the Amis “origin story” is, like, what is the cultural narrative of how their people came into existence, like their version of Adam and Eve, and she gave me this sad look—a mixture of embarrassment and grief—and told me: “I’m sorry; I don’t know.” The irony is that she has nothing to be sorry about. It’s the oppressors who silenced and shunned her people’s stories who should be sorry.
In promoting the book, I’ve stumbled upon some amazing folks through social media who are exploring intersections of Taiwan art, activism, indigenous culture, and food systems. I’m hoping one day to collaborate more with this global network of community-builders.
Q: Lastly, can you share a little more about your upcoming book Sky Luck (out September 2025)?
A: The book is being published by Blue Dot Kids Press and illustrated by the talented Dagmar Smith. After a big feast on a dark desert night, children gather outside to search for shooting stars. One by one, they squeal in delight, pointing at meteors blazing through the sky. But one boy has no such luck in seeing a shooting star and believes that he’s run out of “sky luck.” His uncle reassures him that sky luck is all around him, even when he’s not looking. This lyrical text reminds young readers about the power of abundant thinking and slowing down to notice nature’s beauty all around us. The story was inspired by a trip with friends to Joshua Tree, California, where we sat outside to watch a meteor shower. “Sky luck” is a phrase my husband coined that night.
Similar to Wild Greens, Beautiful Girl, it deals with themes of nature—and weirdly also features a nameless protagonist (“the boy”). I swear it’s not intentional! Let’s hope my third published book has a character with a memorable name. To be determined. Stay tuned!
Erica Lee Schaikjer grew up as a mixed-race third culture kid in a Foreign Service family, living in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Switzerland, and the United States. Her mother is Falangaw Amis, indigenous to Taiwan. Her father is white American. She writes stories about the joy of belonging, the beauty of fleeting moments, and the wonders of nature. She currently lives with her husband in Los Angeles—the ancestral lands of the Tonva, Tataviam, Serrano, Kizh, and Chumash peoples.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the fifth interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: First Love Language
Author: Stefany Valentine
Publisher: Penguin Workshop (an imprint of Penguin Random House)
Release Date: January 14, 2025
Genre/Format: Young Adult Contemporary Romance
Cover Artist: Babeth Lafon
Synopsis
For fans of Frankly in Love and Tokyo Ever After comes a romantic dramedy about finding love and reconnecting with your culture in the most surprising ways.
Taiwanese American Catie Carlson has never fit in with her white family. As much as she loves her stepmom and stepsister, she yearns to understand more about her culture and find her biological mother.
So Catie is shocked when an opportunity comes knocking on her door: Her summer spa coworker, Toby, says he’ll teach her Mandarin. In exchange, she needs to teach him how to date so he can finally work up the courage to ask out his crush. The only problem is that Catie doesn’t actually have any dating experience. But she can fake it.
With her late father’s copy of The Five Love Languages and all his annotated notes, Catie becomes the perfect dating coach. Or so she thinks. As she gets dangerously close to Toby and to finding out what really happened to her biological mom, she realizes that learning the language of love might be tougher than she thought.
Stefany Valentine’s debut novel is both a fresh, fun romance as well as a profound, luminous story about grief, family, transracial adoption, and what it means to truly follow your heart.
Interview with Stefany Valentine
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: Omg I love this question because I have a fun story to tell with it!! As you know, I found my biological mom while writing FLL. I was able to go back to Taiwan to hug her and walk the streets where I spent my kindergarten years. While I was at a street market, my mom got me some guava with li hing powder on it. And as I was eating it, the flavor of the powder and the crunch of the guava took me back to my earliest memories. It was like that scene in Ratatouille where the food critic takes a bite of ratatouille and it takes him back to a day where his mom made him ratatouille after falling off his bike. That was the moment I learned that taste is a sense that holds on to memories better than smell does. Because of these experiences, simple foods like guava and soy milk have become my favorite foods as they are also, in a way, the foods that welcomed me home.
Q: On your website/blog, you mention it took seven manuscripts and nine years to get a literary agent and then eventually your first book deal. Were you writing for the young adult market with all of those manuscripts? What drew you to writing YA specifically?
A: Yes, I was writing YA. There is something about it that I’ve always gravitated towards. I feel like the reason why it calls to me is because I have blurred memories of my own teen years. Between growing up without my biological mom and having lost my father to cancer, I needed something to escape into. Books were that thing. And now that I’m an adult, I’m allowing myself to relive the years that were a blur to me but in a healthy and fun way.
Q: Catie’s story is loosely based on your own experience as a transracial adoptee who was cut off from her Taiwanese heritage. Did you ever find it difficult to separate the fictional story from your real experiences? How did you create the separation needed to tell the story you wanted to tell?
A: Yes, in some ways it was difficult to separate the fiction from reality because the topics were so close to home. There were parts when writing that made me cry healing tears because I felt so deeply the things that Catie felt. But also no because I made a lot of things up. It’s fiction, after all. For instance, in the chapter “Red Light, Green Light,” all of the things Catie feels are things I’ve felt. I just swapped out Catie’s story with a game of red light, green light when my own experience came from a game of heads up, seven up—hahaha.
The thing I love about fiction, though, is the fact that I can explore those “real” things from a distance. Sometimes when I’m reading non-fic or reading a memoir, I have to stop reading because the topic is too painful to endure. With fiction, there’s a buffer. It makes those painful things palatable.
Q: In your acknowledgments, you mention that you went through a lot of major revisions before First Love Language took on its final form, which is almost nothing like the early manuscript. What kinds of edits did you make along the way, and what did you find most challenging during this process?
A: For one, the initial manuscript didn’t mention Mormons. But from an outside perspective, it was clear the story was set around Mormon culture, so I was thrilled when Elizabeth (my editor) said to just make them Mormons. I grew up Mormon so it just made sense to incorporate that.
Another change that I made was that the first draft was more about the language lessons as a whole. However, I went on sub with First Love Language while I was also writing a short story for the adoptee anthology When We Become Ours. While writing the short story, I think I realized that the adoptee storyline had to be stronger in First Love Language, so I pulled it out of sub, revised it, sent it back out, and it was later bought by my editor at Penguin Workshop.
Q: The 5 Love Languages framework created by Gary Chapman is a big part of the story. I’ve known about it for a while, but since I haven’t read the original version of the book he wrote and primarily learned about it secondhand, I didn’t really find out about Chapman and the book’s various issues (including misogyny, heteronormativity, etc.) until later. I thought it was cool that First Love Language actually explicitly addresses those shortcomings of the framework as it was originally conceived. Did the love languages element always exist as part of the story, or was that something added later?
A: I felt like it HAD to be a part of the story. I loved the play on love languages and Mandarin lessons. They just go hand in hand. However, if I was going to include something with harmful origins, I needed to do that with intention. I think Catie’s Mormon roots help shine a light on her proximity to the heteronormativity and misogyny of the love languages. That said, I wanted to utilize the pop culture element of them without claiming or perpetuating any harm. I think having a strong ensemble of queer characters helps with that.
Additionally, Catie and Toby’s relationship isn’t a “typical” hetero relationship. Toby’s not some macho guy, and Catie’s not some damsel in distress. If anything, I feel like their relationship feels very bi coded—mostly because I myself am bi and came to terms with that while writing this book. The greatest compliment I’ve gotten about FLL is how queer it is. It’s like the perfect middle finger to the Mormon Proclamation to the World (a letter from Mormon prophets that push Chapman’s heteronormative ideology), and to the origins of the love languages as a whole.
Q: I like how Catie’s stepsister Mavis is in many ways set up to be a foil to Catie. How did you go about developing this character and her dynamic with Catie?
A: I don’t know that I did that intentionally. But when writing her character, I just wrote what I knew. Mavis’s character was pulled from this cultivation of my sisters and my edgy younger self. But I do love that Mavis became a foil for Catie. Catie was open to coming to Utah and later found love. Mavis was less eager and in turn struggled to find her place. In the end, they were both able to bloom where they were planted.
Additionally, I think Mavis represents the parts of myself that I wasn’t so aware of while Catie represents the wounds that I’ve always carried. I think Mavis has a level of anger and queerness that were secondary to my pillars of identity. The focus of First Love Language is obviously language and cultural reconnections. But Mavis’s queerness, honesty, and resilience are also aspects of my identity that I feel like I am now grappling with.
Q: Beyond simply being a representation of a person, love interests in romance tend to be symbols representing certain ideals, serving as vehicles for the main character’s growth and the development of the story’s themes. What do you think Toby represents within the story?
A: Toby is everything I wished I’d had when growing up. I just needed a kind, understanding, purple-haired, Mandarin speaking soul to help me understand the complicated feelings I’ve had about my identity. I didn’t have a Toby growing up, but I’m glad Catie does.
Q: I saw that your second novel, Love Makes Mochi, is set to come out in 2026. Can you share a little more about it, or give us a little teaser?
A: Yes!! So Mochi is sapphic!! I recently saw the cover—it’s a work in progress, but it’s coming soon and IT’S SO STINKEN CUUUUTE!!! It’s the third book in a series where each author writes a different installment. Before reading Mochi, I suggest grabbing Love Requires Chocolate by Ravynn K. Stringfield and Love Craves Cardamom by Aashna Avachat.
Stefany Valentine is an emerging young adult author. Her first publication is featured in the adoptee anthology, When We Became Ours, and her sophomore title, Love Makes Mochi, is expected to release with Joy Revolution in 2026.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the fourth interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: How to Draw a Secret
Author: Cindy Chang
Publisher: Allida, HarperAlley (imprints of HarperCollins Publishers)
For fans of Raina Telgemeier’s Sisters and Jen Wang’s Stargazing comes the empowering autobiographical story of a young Taiwanese American artist struggling to find her voice to save what matters most.
Twelve-year-old Cindy relishes drawing flawless images, but she is stumped by an art contest prompt: “What family means to me.” No one at school can know that Cindy’s dad moved back to Taiwan four years ago, so Cindy sketches out the perfect plan to draw the perfect picture while keeping her parents’ separation secret.
Then an unexpected trip to Taipei reveals devastating new secrets. Suddenly everything from Cindy’s art to her family is falling apart. With her dream of perfection in tatters, Cindy must figure out how to draw from her heart and share her secrets. But can she really reveal the truth, messy lines and all?
Interview with Cindy Chang
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: Oh wow—this is such a tough question because there are so many favorites! I absolutely love doujiang with youtiao and fantuan. Every time we visited Taiwan, it was the first thing we’d eat right off the plane, so it holds a special place in my heart. I’m also a big fan of beef noodle soup, and there’s this incredible Taiwanese ice cream peanut brittle cilantro spring roll (a night market classic) that I can never resist.
Q: How to Draw a Secret is a semi-autobiographical story. What kinds of changes did you make to either fictionalize the story or make it more cohesive as a narrative?
A: Much of the book is inspired by real events from my own life, though I did make some changes to shape it into a cohesive story. For instance, I introduced the art competition to help tie the narrative together, and I shifted the timeline—these events actually happened during the summer after 8th grade for me, rather than in the spring of 6th grade as they do in the book. Many of the characters, like the teacher and friends, are based on real people (with some names changed). And the character of Cindy is definitely much braver than I was back then.
Q: The process for making an entire graphic novel is a long one. How do you go aboutorganizing your thoughts and ideas when you get started? Do you outline or create a script in text form to follow before the drawing stages? Or do you use visual tools or some sort, or a combination of both?
A: I definitely learned a lot and experimented quite a bit as I figured out my process. Interestingly, I actually started by sketching out a flashback scene from the book—just to play and explore. I wrote bits of dialogue, created rough thumbnails, and brought a few pages to higher fidelity to get a feel for the tone and pacing. After that, I went back and wrote a full outline, which I revised several times before drafting the full script in text form.
One thing I found fascinating was how much panel thinking creeps into the writing stage—you start imagining how things might be laid out on the page, even though nothing’s set in stone yet. For me, that early layout thinking was more of a soft guide that became clearer as I worked through the thumbnail phase.
I used a mix of tools: a notebook, computer, and iPad. I especially love working in a notebook—it helps me think more freely and visually without getting too caught up in the tech side of things.
Q: Every page in a graphic novel involves a series of decisions regarding paneling and layouts: the size and shape and flow of the panels, whether to have elements protrude outside borders or overlap other elements, etc. Do you find this process intuitive when creating, or is it something that you spend more time thinking about explicitly? Are there any pages in How to Draw a Secret where the layout changed a lot from initial draft to final draft, or that you struggled with?
A: I love this question! It touches on one of my favorite aspects of working in the graphic novel medium—the sheer creativity and range it offers. You have so many tools at your disposal—panels, layouts, speech bubbles, typeface, and more—not just to tell the story, but to shape the whole experience of reading it: the emotion, the tone, the rhythm, etc.
I absorbed a lot just from reading other graphic novels, and I found the process surprisingly intuitive—almost like watching a movie in my head. But thumbnailing, the first phase where you’re really mapping out the full book and making key layout decisions, definitely required a ton of brain power.
After I’d thumbnailed a few chapters, I got feedback from my editor and designer about making the chapter openers more consistent. Originally, they varied a lot—some opened on the left, some on the right; some started with a full-page panel, others with multiple panels. I ended up deciding I wanted each chapter to start on a left-hand page with a full-page panel. That meant going back and making sure every chapter ended on a right-hand page. At that point, I had about five chapters thumbnailed, so I had to do some major layout surgery—condensing panels, adding new ones, and reshuffling things to make it all flow well within those new constraints. That’s probably where the layouts changed the most from the initial draft to the final version.
Throughout the process, I also got smaller notes—like adding a panel or moment here and there—which often meant adjusting the layout of an entire page. Some scenes went through more revisions than others, especially the big emotional ones, like the family fight scene on page 174 and the climax of the story. Getting those moments to land just right was worth every tweak.
Q: Did you do any kind of research or look for/make references for the art in the book, and if so, what did that entail?
A: I definitely relied on a lot of references while making the book. If you scrolled through my camera roll from that time, you’d find a bunch of ridiculous selfies—me pulling certain facial expressions, mimicking body language, or figuring out how a hand might look in a specific pose. I also turned to Google frequently, especially when trying to capture the right atmosphere for certain settings—like the night markets in Taiwan, the funeral home, or city streets.
But a lot of it came from memory too. The interiors of my childhood home, my aunt’s house, my grandma’s place—those weren’t things I needed to look up. Drawing them felt like walking through old, familiar hallways in my mind. It was really special to revisit the spaces that shaped me and bring them into the story.
Q: In the acknowledgements, you mentioned that the creation of this book was a journey where you “learned to find [your] voice.” What kinds of challenges did you face, and what helped you overcome them?
A: Ooh, great question. This story is incredibly personal to me. Many of the secrets in the book were ones I kept buried for years—well into adulthood. In that sense, simply telling the story felt like an act of defiance. It went directly against what I was taught as a kid: to keep quiet, to never speak about it. So from the very beginning, the process was both exciting and terrifying. I remember feeling especially nervous when I first shared it with critique partners or when I was querying agents. I didn’t always have the words to talk about my own experience, because I hadn’t fully processed what had happened yet.
But over time, through the act of creating the book—writing it, drawing it—I began to heal. I found my voice by working through those memories and shaping them into a narrative. The process gave me a new way to understand what I had been through. Storytelling and artmaking became a kind of therapy for me.
What helped me move forward was honest, compassionate feedback, the support of others, and simply continuing to show up for the work. In the beginning, I wanted to write everything exactly as it happened—after so many years of silence, I felt a deep need to document every detail. But I eventually realized that to create a meaningful story, I had to shape those memories into something cohesive. It wasn’t about reliving every moment exactly—it was about finding the emotional truth and building something that could speak to others too.
Q: Creating art for yourself is different from creating for an audience, especially when it becomes a commercial product like a traditionally published book. What kinds of reflections or advice do you have regarding navigating the publication process and all the external demands and pressures that come with it?
A: Such an important question. Creating art for yourself is often intuitive and personal—you’re following your curiosity, your feelings, your voice. But once your work enters the world as a published book, it inevitably becomes something more public and layered. There are deadlines, expectations, marketing plans, and sometimes even questions about how “relatable” or “marketable” your story is. It can be a lot.
One thing I’ve learned is how important it is to hold onto the original spark that made you want to tell the story in the first place. That inner compass is what will help you stay grounded when you start to feel pulled in different directions. It’s also okay to have boundaries. You don’t have to say yes to everything. You don’t have to share everything. It’s still your story, even if it’s out in the world.
At the same time, I’ve found that connecting with readers, editors, and other creators can be really meaningful. Sometimes their interpretations or emotional responses helped me see my own work in new ways. It became a conversation, not just a product.
So my advice would be to give yourself permission to protect your creative process. Keep a little corner of your art that’s just for you, where you can explore freely without pressure. And when the demands of publishing start to feel overwhelming, return to that quiet place to remember why you create in the first place.
Q: Now that your debut is behind you, what kinds of projects and stories are you hoping to tackle next? What kind of career do you envision for yourself as an author?
A: I’m currently working on another middle grade novel! This one isn’t semi-autobiographical like How to Draw a Secret, but it still carries a lot of who I am—my thoughts, questions, and the things I care deeply about. With How to Draw a Secret, I was writing the book I wish I had when I was younger, something that could have helped me make sense of what I was going through. I think that’s a theme I want to carry forward: writing stories I wish existed when I needed them most.
I’m really interested in creating books that help kids feel seen—stories that are emotionally honest and tackle real issues, even ones I’m still working through myself. In many ways, writing has become a form of therapy for me. It’s a way of processing, reflecting, and making sense of complicated emotions and experiences. If my stories can offer even a small moment of comfort or clarity to a reader, that means the world.
Looking ahead, I’d love to continue exploring middle grade, but I’m also excited to branch out into other formats—picture books, board books, maybe even chapter books. I love the idea of building a body of work that reaches kids at different ages and stages. Ultimately, I hope to grow a career that’s creatively rich and emotionally honest—one where I can keep experimenting, learning, and telling stories that matter.
Cindy Chang was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she lives today. She received degrees in computer science and education from Stanford University, and she currently works as a digital product designer in addition to writing and illustrating children’s books. Cindy enjoys eating bo luo bao to this day and is dreaming of her next trip back to Taiwan. How to Draw a Secret is her first book.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the third interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: The Fourth Daughter
Author: Lyn Liao Butler
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing (an imprint of Amazon Publishing)
Release Date: August 1, 2025
Genre/Format: Adult Fiction
Cover Designer: Alison Impey
Synopsis
In Taiwan, the bond between grandmother and granddaughter opens up a healing world for them both in an inspiring family saga about the comfort of food, untold histories, and indomitable mother love.
Chef Liv Kuo’s star is on the rise…until a traumatic incident leaves her emotionally unable to venture outside her Manhattan apartment. But an unexpected reason to break free comes from Ah-Ma, Liv’s beloved grandmother in Taiwan. Ah-Ma needs Liv’s help in finding her fourth daughter, taken from her when the girl was an infant. After all these years, it seems impossible. It’s also a mystery: Ah-Ma’s fourth daughter is an aunt Liv never even knew existed.
After landing in Taiwan, Liv hears the heartbreaking story of her grandmother’s plight in a country once under martial law, of choices made for her, and of the hopeful search for a lost girl that has endured for more than sixty years. Like the enriching food and traditions that bind Liv and Ah-Ma, their journey for answers brings them together.
And it’s a quest that turns up both a precious old cookbook and a tale of fatal betrayal that shakes everything Liv believed about her family—revelations that could also give her the courage to face the trauma she left behind.
Interview with Lyn Liao Butler
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: Hands down, rou geng. I love that thick soup and I crave it all the time—it makes me think of Taiwan. Also shaved ice. There’s nothing as refreshing as a giant bowl of Taiwanese shaved ice; I prefer chewy toppings like tapioca pearls and taro balls.
Q: The Fourth Daughter moves between present and past to chronicle a story of the White Terror era of Taiwanese history and its legacy, filtered through the personal family history of Liv Kuo and her maternal Ah-Ma. Why did you choose to have the granddaughter as the primary narrator as opposed to, say, one of Ah-Ma’s other daughters?
A: Because Liv is most like me—someone who grew up in America and doesn’t know as much about her Taiwanese heritage. She is so entrenched in her American life that she never really thought to wonder about what her ancestors or even her grandparents lived through during the White Terror era. I wanted this book to give people, whether they are Taiwanese Americans or not, a glimpse of what life was like back then.
Q: You mention in your author’s note that you only found out about the martial law period as an adult, despite having been born in Taiwan. Even though I was taught some of the basics of this history by my parents as a teen, as an adult I continue to learn more about it every year. There are a lot of gaps and silences in both official and personal narratives due to the violent suppression that happened. As you were doing research for this book, what kinds of gaps did you come across and how did you navigate them while writing the book?
A: So many Taiwanese people were afraid to talk about what happened during this era due to that suppression, which I think is why growing up in America, I didn’t really know much about it. I was lucky to be asked to edit Li-pei Wu’s memoir where a lot of those gaps were answered for me through his perspective. But there were still a lot of questions in my mind, and I filled them in with my imagination. I wanted to tell the story of what happened to two families during this era.
Q: While she is learning about her Ah-Ma’s traumatic past, Liv is also struggling with her own traumatic experience of being shot at and witnessing her coworker’s death by the same gunman at her workplace. Was this element always a part of the story, and what led to the idea for it?
A: Yes, I wanted Liv to have her own trauma to deal with, but originally, it was her best friend Amy who was shot. My editor thought that would have been too much for Liv to work through (and would make a whole separate book in of itself), so we decided to make it a co-worker she didn’t know well instead. Through learning about Ah-Ma’s past, Liv comes to find the courage to face her own trauma.
Q: Food plays an important role in the story for Liv, who works as a chef until the shooting happens. As she learns more about her Ah-Ma, she also reconnects with Taiwanese cuisine, something she has avoided incorporating into her professional culinary repertoire. Can you talk a bit about the specific dishes you chose to feature and the significance of these dishes? Did you dig into your own family recipes for reference?
A: All the dishes that Liv and Ah-Ma make together are from my own childhood. Things that my parents made for us or that we used to eat when we lived in Taiwan. Both my parents cooked, although my father more than my mother, and yes, I did ask them for their recipes when I chose the dishes I wanted to feature in the book. Originally, my agent and I thought of adding recipes to the book, but then it became too much for me to try to write down because my father doesn’t cook from recipes, so I gave up on that idea.
Q: The Fourth Daughter is your sixth book to date, but writing doesn’t necessarily get easier with each new book. What would you say was the most difficult part about writing The Fourth Daughter? Did you learn anything new from this experience?
A: This book was actually the easiest book for me to write, even though I think it’s the most difficult subject matter I’ve ever tackled and rooted in a lot of turmoil that people are afraid to talk about. It just flowed out of me, everything I’d learned and everything I let my imagination fill in. The hardest part was probably trying to get the recipes for the dishes I featured—lol. And yes, I learned even more about Taiwanese history and wanted to convey some of that to readers.
Q: Your next book, The Deadly Book Club, is a thriller involving a book club murder. Can you share a little more about this upcoming book and what readers can expect?
A: The Deadly Book Club is completely different than The Fourth Daughter. It’s told from the POV of all five bookstagrammers, only one of whom is Taiwanese American. The five book influencers are on a virtual book club meeting when suddenly their videos cut out but the audio stays on, and they hear one of their own being brutally murdered. Who was killed and why? Was it one of them that killed her? It’s a bit unhinged, with all five doing bad things and having secrets that need to stay hidden. Writing a thriller for me is much harder than writing a book like The Fourth Daughter because there needs to be twists and turns and the pacing has to be spot on to keep the reader engaged as they try to figure out what’s going on.
Lyn Liao Butler is a Taiwanese American author of thrillers, upmarket fiction, and rom-coms. Her thriller, Someone Else’s Life, was an instant Amazon bestseller and her second book Red Thread of Fate was a finalist in the WFWA Star Awards for 2023. Before becoming an author, she was a professional ballet and modern dancer, and is still a fitness and yoga instructor.
Lyn divides her time between New York and Kauai with her FDNY husband, their son, two rescue dogs, and a myriad of foster animals. When not writing, you can find her sewing for her Etsy shop and trying yoga poses on a stand-up paddle board. So far, she has not fallen into the water yet.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
Welcome to the second interview in the 2025 run of my Taiwanese American Heritage Week series dedicated to featuring Taiwanese authors and their work. Taiwanese American Heritage Week occurs every year during the week that begins with Mother’s Day in May, which is also Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You can find the past interviews and posts in this series via the Taiwanese American Heritage Week tag or through my Post Index.
About the Book
Title: Love Points to You
Author: Alice Lin
Publisher: Delacorte Romance (an imprint of Random House Children’s Books)
Release Date: March 4, 2025
Genre/Format: Young Adult Contemporary Romance
Cover Artist: Jacqueline Li
Synopsis
A swoony rivals-to-lovers romance between driven, practical Lynda Fan and her rich, arrogant classmate, Angela Wu. When Angela offers Lynda the chance to design characters for her Otome game, Lynda discovers things she never knew about herself…or her heart.
Love is an art.
Sixteen-year-old Lynda Fan has the skills and the drive to get into the Rhode Island School of Design—but not the money. Her parents are too busy paying off her stepsister’s violin lessons to help Lynda get into art school.
So when her rich and arrogant classmate, Angela Wu, offers to hire Lynda as a character designer for an otome game—a love story-based video game—she jumps at the opportunity.
Lynda isn’t exactly a romantic, but in pursuit of her dreams, she discovers things she never knew about herself while also finding love with every heart she draws.
Interview with Alice Lin
Q: This is a question I ask all of the first-time participants for this interview series: what’s your favorite Taiwanese food(s), or alternatively, what food most reminds you of home?
A: O-a-tsian and taiyang bing!
Q: In the Acknowledgements of Love Points to You, you mention that this book in its earliest conception started out as a story about an artist named Lynda Fan running away from home while rediscovering her dreams, and that version of the story got shelved until you decided to rewrite it in 2021. What triggered the desire to rewrite this story? What wasn’t working, and what changes do you feel made the story stronger?
A: The original manuscript that inspired Love Points to You was too quiet. There was barely a romance (and Angela was not the love interest); there was no stepfamily, and the story simply wasn’t engaging. Ultimately, I’m glad that book didn’t get published.
That said, I couldn’t abandon Lynda Fan as a character. After publishing my debut novel, Fireworks, I knew Lynda had to be in my next book. I also knew that I needed a strong hook if I wanted her story to reach the hands of readers. One day, I was brainstorming ways to rewrite the story while retaining certain plot elements, and the idea just hit me. Art school + otome game = Love. I decided to lean more into the romance to make the story fun and playful, which was needed given Lynda’s personality and her frustrating relationship with her family.
Q: Love Points to You features multiple characters who pursue creative passions (Lynda with visual art, Angela with writing, and Josie with violin) and struggle with their relationship to external markers of success and validation. Did your own journey to becoming a published author influence your approach to this theme, and if so, how?
A: Success and validation can often feel elusive as an author. You finish writing and editing a book after months, maybe years—success! Next, you need to find a literary agent who’ll represent you. Finally, after crafting a query letter and receiving countless rejections, you land an agent—success! Then the search begins for an editor who’ll love your book, and the goalposts continue to shift with each victory.
When writing Lynda, Angela, and Josie, I wanted to illustrate how insecurity can manifest in different ways. With Josie, she’s not academically gifted compared to Lynda, and that puts more pressure on Josie to be better at the violin. With Angela, I wanted to show how one can be confident and ambitious but still afraid to share their creative endeavors with the world. Finally, with Lynda, I wanted her to acknowledge her own vulnerability and fear of failure.
Q: Another aspect of the book I found compelling is the exploration of the different parent-child and family dynamics for the different major characters within the book. Can you share your thought processes when developing these characters and relationships?
A: I think all families are complicated. Mine certainly is.
As a young child, I used to believe adults had all the answers. As a teenager, I thought I had all the answers. Now, I often wonder what it means to be an adult—and that is a question that did influence the way I portrayed the adults in Lynda’s life.
When creating the different family dynamics in Love Points to You, I didn’t want to mirror my own life. However, I did want to explore some of the emotions I felt growing up by crafting relationships and situations that would evoke similar feelings in my characters.
Q: You mentioned in an interview about your debut novel Fireworks that you struggle a bit with writing flirtatious scenes, and there is actually a decent number of those in Love Points to You. Are there any materials (such as books, shows, other media) that you’ve referenced to help with this aspect? Do you think you’ve gotten any better at it since your debut?
A: Lynda and Angela were a fun pair to write, so I think their flirting scenes were easier to write this time. I still struggled though. During the drafting stage, I had to read a few YA romances to get myself in the mood to write those lovey-dovey moments. Playing otome games helped, too.
Q: Although there has been progress with Asian representation in YA over the past 10+ years, queer Asian representation still constitutes a fairly small share of the stories, and queer Taiwanese stories specifically are still few and far in between, a gap that I feel quite acutely as a queer Taiwanese reader and writer. I think Love Points to You is the second or third traditionally published sapphic YA with Taiwanese main character, and the first YA with a Taiwanese main character on the asexual spectrum, that I’ve come across in almost 20 years of following the developments in Taiwanese representation in kidlit. Did an awareness of these gaps, with the possibilities and pressures they present, shape how you wrote this book at all? Are there any other such gaps that you see and want to fill as a writer?
A: This is a great question—and I’m afraid I don’t have a good answer for you! Honestly, I just wrote the book that I wanted to write (within the deadline my publisher gave me). Although I am aware that YA literature is lacking in various areas, I wouldn’t say I deliberately set out to fill any gaps when writing Love Points to You. I will continue writing stories that speak to me, and those stories tend to include Taiwanese American leads and queer characters. That said, I’d love to read a YA romance set in Taiwan with a male love interest who is on the aro/ace spectrum.
Q: Related to the previous question, can you share what you are currently working on or what kind of story you want to tackle next?
A: I’ve been slowly plugging away at a visual novel (a passion project), but I may put that on hold to focus on the next book I’d like to write, which is a YA mystery loosely inspired by Yeh-Shen (aka Chinese Cinderella).
Alice Lin is the author of Fireworks and Love Points to You. She is an avid reader who first started dreaming up stories in sixth grade and who loves to get lost in other people’s imaginations. She holds a master’s degree in library and information science from Rutgers University and has a working background in public libraries.
Thanks for reading this interview! If you’re enjoying my Taiwanese American Heritage Week posts and would like to show your appreciation by tossing a coin to your blogger, please consider donating that money to Crips for eSIMs for Gaza instead. Crips for eSIMs for Gaza is a collective of disabled volunteers who are helping to keep Palestinians in Gaza connected to the Internet during the ongoing genocide.
READING (AS)(I)AN (AM)ERICA 
