Name: Natasha Yim

Website: www.natashayim.com

Asian background:  Chinese

What is it about your experience and upbringing that inspired you the most to write? 

I was always surrounded by books. My parents were avid readers, and my mother always read to us or told us stories at night. I grew up loving books and reading. When I was in 7th grade, an English teacher gave us an assignment to create our own desert island, make up names for the villages/towns, mountains, rivers, lakes and anything else we wanted to put in there, people it with characters, and write a story. I was hooked! From then on, I wanted to be a writer.
I started out writing short stories and poems as a teen, then after college, I wrote nonfiction articles for journals, newspapers, and magazines. It wasn’t until I was working as a counselor in a residential treatment center for disadvantaged youth, that I realized the power of story to soothe, calm, connect with, and inspire kids. I decided I wanted to write for children, and have been a children’s author and freelance writer ever since. 

Name 3 authors and 3 books: 

Anne of Green Gables (Lucy Montgomery), To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee), A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving).

Authors: Stacey Lee (YA Historical Fiction), David Sedaris, and LIbba Bray.

What do you think is the best quality a writer can have? 

I try to live by the three P’s: Patience, Persistence, Perseverance.

Any last words?

My upcoming picture book LUNA’S YUM YUM DIM SUM, will be released by Charlesbridge Publishing on Dec. 20, 2020.