Taiwanese-American best-selling author Livia Blackburne last month published a new picture book that tells the story of a young girl who moves to the US and must leave behind her beloved grandmother.
In an interview with the Central News Agency, Blackburne said that the story was inspired by her own childhood experiences.
Like the protagonist in the book, she moved to the US at the age of five and needed to learn how to keep in touch with her grandmother while separated by the Pacific Ocean.
Photo: CNA
“When I was growing up, it was very difficult being in a different country from her — and after a while, I started to lose my Chinese and had a harder time communicating with her,” Blackburne said.
“After she passed away, I would dream about her,” Blackburne said. “In my dreams, I would always be talking to her in English, which was something we would never have been able to do while she was alive.”
These dreams were what spurred her to write the book I Dream of Popo, titled after the name she used for her grandmother, she said.
Photo courtesy of Livia Blackburne via CNA
The book’s illustrator and editor are also Taiwanese-American, Blackburne added.
I Dream of Popo is Blackburne’s first foray into children’s literature. Her past works, including her debut novel, Midnight Thief, are fantasy novels for young adults.
Her career as a writer began somewhat accidentally, Blackburne said, adding that she wrote Midnight Thief to keep her sanity while pursuing a doctorate in cognitive neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The book, which went on to become a New York Times bestseller, is better written than her doctoral thesis, she said.
Some might see Blackburne’s two passions — science and fiction — as polar opposites, but the author said that their similarities have influenced her writing.
Science is an imaginative endeavor, as researchers need to be creative to make breakthroughs, while fiction is imagined, but has truth at its core, she said.
“So this book is a fictional story, but there is a lot of truth about family and love,” Blackburne added.
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