“More than an author, she is an explorer of worlds—both external and internal. A physicist by training, she applies logic and consistency not to science itself, but to the craft of storytelling: from metaphors and imagery to the rules of her own narrative universes. A polyglot, traveler, martial artist, diver, freediving champion, and yoga instructor, she blends discipline and curiosity to create stories that are cinematic, visceral, and deeply immersive. Her narratives invite readers to feel, to question, and to embrace the subtle mysteries that lie just beyond understanding.”
In my free time I like watching C-dramas (Wuxia/Xianxia) and reading—mostly webnovels in the fantasy/sci-fi genre these days.
I like fresh stories with different motivations or twists than what we’re used to from Hollywood and mainstream media. Good vs. evil to me is incredibly boring. I like villains with relatable backstories, traumas and a good amount of cunning, or even better, when you don’t know who the villains are supposed to be and conflict is messy.
I’ve been privately studying what I find makes a fascinating story vs. a boring one for years (subjective of course), and I’ve been living inside stories that filled my head for as long as I can remember
Some Q/A
Who’s your favorite author?
If I had to pick just one, it’d be Philip K. Dick. I really like Brandon Sanderson and Dan Simmons as well, but they haven’t had the emotional impact that Dick’s work has had o me. Another star in my book world is Robert Anton Willson. I doubt any one author has influenced me as much as he has.
So you like C-dramas… which one do you like best?
This is hard to answer. There are definitely a lot of dramas that are NOT my favorite but a lot of them really wowed me too. I’ll give you a list:
- Nirvana in Fire (amazing intrigue, fantastic story)
- Nirvana in Fire II (different, more emotional, still great)
- Legend of Fuyao (I have to pretend I didn’t watch the ending here, everything else was great. I love Fuyao’s arcs here, so much suffering and growth. It’s very grimdark in a c-drama way)
- Legend of the Condor Heroes / Heavenly Sword Dragon Slaying Saber (classics, I read the books too. I watchd the 2017 versions of them, they get remade every few years and I don’t know which is the best, but I loved the ones I saw. Brilliant story, great characters, complex everything.)
- Eternal Love (ok, yes, terrible title, a bit cheesy, but also a great story)
- Untamed (BL, and granted the drama isn’t nearly as good as the book, but still worth watching)
- Word of Honor (Also BL, with amazing Jianghu vibes, and I really loved the later blacklisted actor Zhang Zhehan. Love how the righteous sects are actually the villains here)
So you’re a scientist?
Formerly I worked as a researcher in a biochemistry lab, as a physicist. I studied applied physics, but I’ll freely admit, academia wasn’t for me. I prefer researching ontology and epistemology on my own.
What influences your writing?
Lots, of course. Everything my mind grazes upon will eventually find its way into my writing. But there are a few specific influences I use deliberately: Integral theory, Jung’s psychology, some of the stranger phenomena in physics and Goedel’s incompleteness theory on one side. Then the experiences from the strange worlds of dreams (lucid or otherwise), psychedelics, sleep paralysis and spiritual practices (particularly Taoism) on the other. It might not be evident, but it’s there.