NEA Big Read 2023: Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

Featured Guests

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  Annie Chen

  Annie Chen

  Annie Chen is a vocalist, composer, and bandleader from Beijing, based in New York since 2013. Her distinctive style draws on a rich continuum of musical traditions from Asia, Europe, and the Americas. As a bandleader, Chen has performed extensively in prestigious New York City venues including the Blue Note, Cornelia St. Cafe, Flushing Town Hall, and Club Bonafide. In China, she has performed at festivals including Shanghai International Jazz Festival and Beijing Nine-Gates Jazz Festival, as well as venues such as Blue Note Beijing, Guangzhou Xinghai Concert Hall, JZ Shanghai, and JZ Hangzhou, where she has been featured as artist-in-residence in 2015, 2016, and 2018. Her 2018 octet recording Secret Treetop was praised by Downbeat as “[a] clear-eyed fusion of East and West with an avant-garde twist,” and was nominated for a CMIC Best Vocal Jazz Album award in China, analogous to a Grammy in the U.S. The album is a follow-up to 2014’s Pisces the Dreamer, which a features a deft traversal of Chinese, Middle-Eastern, Eastern European, and Afro-American musical landscapes.

  Chen studied classical piano beginning at age four at China’s Central Conservatory of Music, graduating in 2008. In 2015 she earned a Masters in Jazz Performance from Queens College, studying with Charenée Wade, Antonio Hart, David Berkman, and Michael Philip Mossman.

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  Ava Chin

  Ava Chin

  Ava Chin is the author of Eating Wildly, winner of the Les Dames d’Escoffier International M.F.K. Fisher Book Prize. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Village Voice, and Saveur. She is the recipient of grants and fellowships from the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center, the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program, New York Foundation for the Arts, New York Institute for the Humanities, and the Asian American Writers’ Workshop. She is an associate professor of creative nonfiction at the City University of New York.

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  Fang Du

  Fang Du

  Fang Du was born in Dandong, China. National Tour: Thoroughly Modern Millie. NY Theatre: Golden Shield (MTC), Golem (La Mama), Julius Caesar (CSC), Low Power (EST), Where Is My Maple Town (Theatre Row). Regional: Henry V (Arkansas Rep), Thoroughly Modern Millie (Fulton Theatre). Film: In A New York Minute, Tomorrow Comes Today, The Assistant. TV: Madam Secretary, The Blacklist, The Haves and The Have Nots, Mr. Robot, Two Sentence Horror Stories. Training: MFA Columbia University; BA, University of Virginia. Proud member of SAG-AFTRA. Always looking forward to the next travel destination with his wife and daughter! Love you, Mom!

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  Wayne Ho

  Wayne Ho

  Wayne Ho is the President and CEO of the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC), the nation’s largest Asian American social services agency. With a mission to promote the social and economic empowerment of Chinese American, immigrant, and low-income communities, CPC serves over 60,000 community members in the areas of education, family support, and community and economic empowerment at 35 locations throughout New York City. Since the pandemic started, CPC has led a recovery platform for Asian American neighborhoods, spoken out against the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes, advocated for hazard pay and PPE for essential workers in the human services sector, distributed over $1.25 million and nearly 100,000 meals to community members, and been quoted in over 150 news stories. Previously, Wayne served as Chief Strategy and Program Officer for the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies (FPWA), an association of 200 community and faith-based member agencies aiming to promote upward mobility of underserved New Yorkers, from 2013-2017, and was the Executive Director of the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families (CACF), the nation’s only pan-Asian children’s advocacy organization, from 2004-2013. Wayne has been recognized by City and State in the inaugural Asian Power 100 in 2020, in the inaugural Nonprofit Power 50 in 2018, and as a 40 Under 40 New York City Rising Star in 2014. He was one of 10 leaders invited to meet with President Obama during the White House’s Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month Celebration in 2011. Wayne serves on numerous boards, including Coro New York Leadership Center and NYC Employment & Training Coalition, and is appointed to several New York City and State advisory boards. Wayne received his Bachelor of Arts from UC Berkeley and his Master in Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

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  Elizabeth Joseph

  Elizabeth Joseph

  Elizabeth Joseph is the Assistant Director of the New Rochelle Public Library. She has served on several book jury panels including Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction and Non Fiction as well as the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. She is a proud member of the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association.

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  Grace Lin

  Grace Lin

  Before Grace Lin was an award-winning and New York Times bestselling author/illustrator of picturebooks, early readers and middle grade novels, she was the only Asian girl (except for her sisters) going to her elementary school in Upstate New York. That experience, good and bad, has influenced her books—including her Newbery Honor Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, her Geisel Honor Ling & Ting, her National Book Finalist When the Sea Turned Silver and her Caldecott Honor A Big Mooncake for Little Star. But, it also causes Grace to persevere for diversity as an occasional New England Public Radio commentator and when she gave her TEDx talk “The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child’s Bookshelf,” as well as her PBSNewHour video essay “What to do when you realize classic books from your childhood are racist?.” She continued this mission with a hundred episodes of the podcast kidlitwomen* and now currently hosts two other podcasts: Book Friends Forever and Kids Ask Authors. In 2016, Grace’s art was displayed at the White House and Grace, herself, was recognized by President Obama’s office as a Champion of Change for Asian American and Pacific Islander Art and Storytelling. In 2022, Grace was awarded the Children’s Literature Legacy Award from the American Library Association.

  Photo Credit: Danielle Tait

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  Sami Ma

  Sami Ma

  Sami (she/hers) is a queer, first-generation daughter of Chinese immigrants enjoying the messy terrain between her traditional Chinese culture and her American upbringing. When not performing, she can usually be found in the kitchen perfecting her family’s passed down recipes or feeding her loved ones absurd amounts of food. Off-Broadway: Once Upon A (korean) Time (Ma-Yi Theatre Company). Select regional credits: The Chinese Lady (Adirondack Theatre Festival & Cincinnati Playhouse), Nativity Variations (Milwaukee Rep), The Great Leap (Portland Center Stage), Vietgone (American Stage), Gloria (Hatch Arts Collective), and 4,000 Miles (Gloucester Stage). TV/Film credits: Tender Ears, Death Saved My Life, and Where the Light Enters. Thank you to The Center for Fiction & NAATCO for having her. For her guardian angel, Jason K. Ma.