I'm a first-generation Chinese American writer, born and raised in Minnesota: lots of lakes, long winters, and a lunchbox that made me the subject of a lot of unsolicited opinions.

My maiden name, Mma, is the Chinese name I grew up with. I write under it because it's the part of me that holds the most stories.

"I'm writing the characters I wanted to read when I was young: Chinese American girls who are simply, fully, themselves."

No token Asian friend. No geeky sidekick. No single-note stereotype. Just the everyday girl, who also happens to be Chinese American, navigating the subtle and not-so-subtle things that come with that, and who deserves to be the full protagonist of her own story.

My fiction lives at the intersection of finding purpose and identity, stories about the people who feel forgotten, the people who are finding themselves, and ways of discovering purpose in ordinary days. Food is always woven in my writing, not as decoration, but as evidence of culture, of love, of the ways we try to hold onto where we came from when the world keeps asking us to let go.

When I'm not writing , I'm running around with my family, on the hunt for the best kinds of foods, and capturing other people’s stories from behind a lens.