About the Author

Thanhha Lai was born in Vietnam in 1965 and fled from the Vietnam war after the fall of Saigon in 1975. She landed in the United States in Montgomery, Alabama where she started a new life and went to the University of Texas, Austin majoring in journalism. After getting her degree at the University of Texas, she moved on to writing for the Orange County, California newspaper The Register  in 1988 where she wrote about Little Saigon, a Vietnamese community. She earned her masters at NYU in fine arts and teaches at Parsons the New School for Design.

In 2005, Lai started an organization for Viet Kids where they donate and raise money for bikes for children. She is now a well known young adult and children’s author – having written three books, Butterfly Yellow, Listen, Slowly, and Inside Out and Back Again. She has won several awards for her novels including the National Book Award and the Newbery Honor. She now resides in New York with her husband, daughter, and dog, Pico, who insists on typing on keyboard while she writes.