I write books for kids and translate from Japanese to English. I love playing with language. In the past, I founded a school and built curricula for teaching world languages to children from newborn through elementary. I like to explore the world through travel, books, language, and (especially) dessert!
My picture book Japan: Better with Cats won CANSCAIP’s 2022 Best Picture Book award (and my picture book Baby Lemur Life made the short list). My middle grade novel Oy Vey, Lily J. won CANSCAIP’s 2021 Best Middle Grade novel by an unpublished author. It’s a verse novel about friendship plus boba tea, Yiddish, soup dumplings and beatboxing.
I’m currently at work/play on a new middle grade novel.
I write for KidLitCraft and WorldKidLit.
I review children’s books in translation and interview book creators.
I’ve also written some articles for ParentMap about raising kids with an appreciation for the world.
Through SCBWI San Francisco/South, I host two book clubs focused on craft. One for middle grade writers and one for picture book writers.
I love languages. I translate from Japanese to English, primarily picture books and middle grade. I also edit translations from other languages.
As the co-editor of World Kid Lit, I hope to expand the reach of children's books from around the world.
In 2020-2021, I was the first Scholar-in-Residence for SCBWI San Francisco/South where I focused on sharing the benefits of reading children’s lit from around the world.