Anu Recommends #10

The interview series returns! Today's guest: Gloria Chao

Hi and welcome to the Storyteller!

Who’s excited about the return of the interview series? I certainly am! When I first started this newsletter, that was my entire focus. In-depth, cozy chats with writers, poets, artists, and others. While I’m enjoying working on what it has since grown into, I was looking forward to the first interview of this new-look edition ever since its relaunch.

Enter Gloria Chao.

If you read last week’s issue, you know that I got a chance to read her new book, When You Wish Upon a Lantern (pub date: February 14, 2023) in advance and really enjoyed it.

Here’s the publisher’s blurb again in case you missed it:

Liya and Kai had been best friends since they were little kids, but all that changed when a humiliating incident sparked The Biggest Misunderstanding Of All Time—and they haven’t spoken since.

Then Liya discovers her family's wishing lantern store is struggling, and she decides to resume a tradition she had with her beloved late grandmother: secretly fulfilling the wishes people write on the lanterns they send into the sky. It may boost sales and save the store, but she can't do it alone . . . and Kai is the only one who cares enough to help.

While working on their covert missions, Liya and Kai rekindle their friendship—and maybe more. But when their feuding families and their changing futures threaten to tear them apart again, can they find a way to make their own wishes come true?

This is definitely my favourite book by her.

Liya and Kai are well-developed characters with their own flaws, wishes, hopes, struggles, and dreams—and their best friendship provides a strong, believable foundation on which to rest their burgeoning romantic feelings for each other. They feel frustrating at times with their teenage stubbornness or their inclination to jump to (and stick with) major conclusions without actually talking to the other person about it, despite plenty of opportunities, but that didn’t stop me from rooting for them. And it all pays off because you eventually get to see them admit and start to learn from their mistakes, face their fears, stand up for themselves, allow for different perspectives, and take the first steps towards their dreams, old and new. Isn’t that what growing up is all about? Though I will say that, to me, they mostly read younger than their ages in the book (incoming high-school seniors).

I particularly enjoyed learning about the Taiwanese and Chinese culture, their festivals, myths, foods, and traditions. Chao weaves everything into the plot really well, along with their neighbourhood and its myriad inhabitants, so none of it ever seems shoe-horned in. Through the course of the book, Liya and Kai build relationships and friendships beyond each other in the tight-knit community that’s around them in this book’s version of Chicago’s Chinatown, and learn how to navigate personal and communal identity in a way that allows themselves space while also honoring legacy and tradition (even changing and updating it when required, and being brave enough to voice that).

A cute, unabashedly wholesome, magical story.

Without further ado, here’s Gloria herself.

Anu: Your writing journey so far—how did you go from being a dentist to a full-time author?

Gloria: I was miserable in dental school, and I turned to reading and writing to help me get through it. It was because of my husband’s support that I ended up switching careers, and while it was a difficult and scary decision at the time, I am now so happy that I did it. Spending my days in fictional characters’ heads is so much better than spending it in real people’s mouths!

Anu: What motivates or draws you to write and tell the stories that you do?

Gloria: My main goal is to write something that entertains myself and is a story I would want to read. I try to come up with fun premises first, and then I take pieces and questions from my life to explore through the characters. I like to delve into morally gray conflicts that don’t have an easy answer, and I like to do it with as much humor as I can.

Anu: Is there any advice you wish you’d gotten when you first started out? Or just any advice for aspiring authors from your own experience, something that’s really helped you in your writing and publishing journey so far?

Gloria: Some of the best advice I’ve gotten that has made the biggest difference for me in this journey is that there isn’t one right way to write. Everyone’s process is different, and the goal is to figure out what works best for you. It may not be what works for others, and that’s okay. Some days I still struggle to embrace my process—brainstorming days where no words are put on the page are especially hard—and that’s all part of the writing journey, too.

Anu: You say that When You Wish Upon a Lantern (your fourth book) is "a love letter to my culture featuring some of my favorite holidays, food, traditions, and folk tales."⁠ Can you elaborate? Going off of that, how do you incorporate details from Taiwanese culture into your stories? Why do you think diverse stories are important?

Gloria: With When You Wish Upon a Lantern, I wanted to write a contemporary book that feels like magic, that would, I hope, remind readers that there’s magic in the real world. And because I wanted to write a joyful book, I ended up weaving in my favorite parts of my childhood and growing up Taiwanese American. I chose the most interesting, unique, and nostalgic traditions and found a way for them to serve the story.

Diverse books are important because there is such a wide range of experiences out there, and books are a wonderful way for readers to explore, ponder, and step into the shoes of a character that is either a lot like them or not at all. 

Anu: What's in the works going forward?

Gloria: I have a short story in the anthology First-Year Orientation, which has interconnected stories following different students on their first day of college. It will be out on April 4. I have some other exciting things in the works that I wish I could share but can’t at this time, so please stay tuned!

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Thank you so much for taking the time out for this chat, Gloria!

You can find her at website | instagram | twitter - all of which have buy links for her books.

As always, please feel free send in recommendations—books, movie, TV shows, authors to interview, ideas of what you’d like me to write on, rants/ramblings/excited monologues, GIFs and memes (especially them) and more. Just drop me a line and turn this into a conversation, even if just to say hi and let me know what you thought of the latest issue :) Or share this with someone you think might enjoy it.

Take care and see you next week! And, as Liya’s late beloved Năinai used to say, may your wishes find the light!

Anu

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