"I read your book." | Sung J. Woo

A short story of mine, “Translation,” appears in the Fall 2008 issue of Hyphen.  For me, the most interesting part of having a story in a magazine is the accompanying art.  Initially, the illustration threw me off — it seemed almost scary to me.  But then I thought about my story, and seen from the point of view of the mother character, I can see the fear that pervades throughout.

Chloe Bonfield

This is what I enjoy the most about having an artist interpret your work: seeing something that wasn’t there before.

By the way, I wrote the first draft of this story in 2004.  Patience is indeed a virtue.

In 2007, I wrote a Lives article for The New York Times Magazine.  At the time, they were using Bob Hambly for their simple yet effective black-and-white logos on top of each essay, and thinking of that logo made me think about having something similar to that in my novel.  After some searching, I found the perfect person to draw these up: my talented wife.  So here they are, a collage of the graphics that appear on each and every chapter of Everything Asian.