About

Hi! My name is Katrina Liu and I’m proud to call myself an American-born-Chinese/Taiwanese mom of 2 and children’s book author from San Francisco, CA.

I grew up in the 80s/90s and went to a predominantly white elementary school. I pushed away everything about my culture because of how badly I wanted to fit in with the other kids. I purposely stopped speaking Chinese at home and hated eating Chinese food. I never truly appreciated my heritage until I became an adult. 

As a child, you’d find me do creative things, whether it was designing friendship bracelets, making short films, writing poems, or drawing storybooks. As I got older, I began teaching myself graphic design and website design. My first job out of college was with a small publishing company as a print and web designer. I eventually moved away from the print industry and into tech. Went on to get my MBA, ended up in Silicon Valley working in product management. 

After a decade in my professional career, I became a mom. As I watched my first daughter, Mina, grow, I witnessed the pure joy she has when drawing with a crayon or creating her own world with play-doh. It made me realize how much I missed the arts. After late hours in the office, I’d rush home with excitement to read bedtime stories to her. We’d cuddle, admire the colorful illustrations and giggle as I made funny voices as I read.

As Mina was about to embark on her next milestone of going to school, l hoped and wished that she would have a better experience than I did. That she could feel confident in herself and proud of her culture and heritage. I also wanted her to have the opportunity to be bilingual ---something that I always regretted pushing away during my childhood. I knew it would be a challenge living in the US in a prominently English-speaking environment.

That’s how I came up with the idea to write my own bilingual children’s books in both Chinese and English for non-native speaking families like ours. There was nothing more fulfilling than creating something that was meaningful to me and my children. 

Fluency in a language is most easily gained if a child is exposed within the first few years of life. I created these books for non-native speakers and like-minded parents interested in fostering the development of dual-language with their children.

My mission is to add more Asian faces into the world of children’s books and to leave a legacy for my daughters by creating books where they can see themselves reflected in them.

As an independent author, this passion project is self-funded. If you support my mission to add more Asian representation to children’s books and dual language learning, I hope you will share my books with your community, friends, and family.

I'm also a self-publishing book coach. If you're interested in publishing your own children's book, check out my book coaching services.

To learn more, Chalk Academy has interviewed me about my process and project. You can read the interview here.

Thank you!

作者簡介 - 我的故事

你好！我叫Katrina Liu, 一位居住在舊金山的美籍華裔媽媽兼兒童書作家。

我是成長在80/90年代的孩子 ，上小學的同學大部分是白人。我當時為了融入環境，任何關於自己文化的東西都被我拒絕了。我在家裡故意停止了講中文，連中國菜也沒心情吃了。我長大後才開始真正地了解和擁抱自己的華裔身份。

我小時候一直很喜歡做有創意的事情，要麼是設計友誼手鏈、拍短片、寫詩、還是畫圖畫書我都做過。當我買到了自己的電腦，我就把我所有的精力和時間集中到學美編。我還記得我媽媽當時的嘮叨，說我在浪費自己的生活。我那時候的夢想是成為藝術家，但像很多亞裔家庭的情況一樣，那條路往往是不可走的。

反而，我选择了进入商业学校，後來獲得了MBA學位，最後在硅谷的一家科技公司當了產品經理。於是20幾歲的那幾年我就忙著促進自己的事業。

经过10年的事业发展，我終於成为了妈妈。每次看我女兒米娜在畫畫或玩彩泥時感到那麼快樂，我禁不住也想了起來自己對藝術的喜愛。下班後我會興奮地趕緊回家陪她讀睡前故事，在用有趣的聲音講故事和欣賞可愛的插畫中我們找到了母女能共享的歡樂。

在米娜將要上學的那時候，我熱切遠望她的童年會比我的精彩很多，希望她能夠自豪地擁抱她的文化和傳統。雖然住在美國這個英文為日常語言的環境意味著學中文不會那麼簡單，我還是想要鼓勵她學雙語，提供給她那個我一直後悔沒有抓住好的機會。

因此我決定了為中文非母語的家庭編寫中英雙語兒童書。創造這麼富有意義的工程對我和我女兒們來說真是無價之寶。

孩子学语言越早，流利度越容易增高，所以我特意為對雙語教育有興趣的中文非母語學生和家長們邊寫出了這系列書，以便提供更多的中英雙語學習資源。

目前我的目標是增加兒童文學裡的亞裔人物，傳播亞裔文化，和給我兩個女兒留下一個能夠反應她們自己身份和文化的文學遺產。

作为独立作家，我非常感谢你们对这项獨資工程的支持。如果你們支持亞裔文化在兒童文學裡的傳播，或者是跟我一樣支持雙語教育，希望你們能與家人和朋友們分享這些書，讓大家一起慶祝亞裔文化！

想了解更多，我在Chalk Academy的採訪中講解了這份工程的背景，歡迎在此閱讀。

谢谢！