Panel: Celebrating Traditions and Writing Magical Stories

Explore how cultural traditions, folklore, and heritage inspire magical storytelling in a conversation with bestselling authors Yangsze Choo, Julie Leong, Aimee Phan, and Julia Vee. The discussion examines reimagining history, weaving myth into fiction, and building fantastical worlds rooted in tradition.

Yangsze Choo is the New York Times bestselling author of The Ghost Bride (now a Netflix original series) and The Night Tiger, a Reese’s Book Club Pick, and a Big Jubilee Read selection for Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee. She lives in California with her family and loves to eat and read (often at the same time). The Fox Wife and all previous novels would not have been possible without large quantities of dark chocolate.

Julie Leong is the USA Today and Sunday Times bestselling author of The Teller of Small Fortunes and The Keeper of Magical Things. She is a daughter of Malaysian Chinese immigrants, a graduate of Yale University, and works in tech. Julie currently lives in San Francisco with her husband and fluffy dog, and when she’s not writing, enjoys making unnecessary spreadsheets and flambéing things.

Aimee Phan is the author of The Reeducation of Cherry Truong (St. Martin's Press, 2012) and We Should Never Meet: Stories (St. Martin's Press, 2004), which was named a Notable Book by the Kiriyama Prize in fiction, as well as a finalist for the 2005 Asian American Literary Awards. Her fiction has appeared in Colorado Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, Chelsea, Prairie Schooner and Meridian. Her nonfiction has appeared in the New York Times, USA Today, Guernica and the Oregonian. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, the MacDowell Colony and Hedgebrook.

Julia Vee was a trial lawyer in Silicon Valley. She attended UC Berkeley and majored in Asian Studies. She often writes with co-author Ken Bebelle. Their novel Ebony Gate, an Asian-inspired contemporary fantasy, was published by TOR and named a 2023 Golden Poppy Finalist for the Octavia E. Butler award. The trilogy conclusion, Pearl City, released in July of 2025.