Lisa See

Episode SummaryBestselling author Lisa See joins Jeniffer and Chad Thompson to discuss her powerful new novel, Daughters of the Sun and Moon. Inspired by real women who lived in Los Angeles during the 1870s, the novel explores friendship, resilience, identity, racism, and survival against the backdrop of the largely forgotten Chinese Massacre of 1871.Lisa discusses how her deeply researched historical fiction emerged from personal questions and themes she was grappling with in her own life. She explores why Los Angeles' violent early history has largely disappeared from public memory and how court records, photographs, and other historical documents helped shape the novel. Throughout the conversation, Lisa reflects on the importance of confronting difficult histories and what can be lost when we choose to forget them.In This Episode:Lisa See's Literary Brand How friendship, family, and women's relationships became recurring themes across Lisa's novels  Why authentic storytelling creates a lasting author brand  The importance of writing from personal curiosity rather than market trends The Inspiration Behind Daughters of the Sun and Moon The true stories that inspired the novel's three main characters:  Dove, a young bride brought to Los Angeles in an arranged marriage  Moon, wife of a prominent Chinese physician  Petal, inspired by women sold into prostitution who fought relentlessly for freedom  Why Lisa wanted to tell this story through the eyes of women The Chinese Massacre of 1871 The little-known tragedy that serves as the novel's historical centerpiece  How 10% of Los Angeles' Chinese population was murdered during one night of violence  Why historians consider it one of the largest mass lynchings in American history A Different Los Angeles Why 1870s Los Angeles was considered one of the most violent towns in the American West  How the city's leaders later worked to erase this history  Lisa's theory about why Hollywood's rise contributed to the public forgetting Los Angeles' violent past Researching the Novel Examining original court documents at the Huntington Library  Discovering handwritten maps, trial transcripts, and historical records  Testing whether Chinese medicinal herbs could actually be grown on a windowsill, just as they are in the novel Chinese Medicine and Cultural Traditions The role of traditional Chinese medicine in the story  Lisa's personal connection to Chinese medicine and acupuncture  The symbolic importance of immigrants carrying soil from their homeland Lisa See's Writing Process Why she writes the final line of every novel before beginning chapter one  How the ending rarely changes, even when the journey does  Her unusual reading habit: reading the first chapter and the last chapter before continuing a book Themes of Memory and History The importance of remembering difficult chapters of history  Connections between historical anti-Chinese violence and modern anti-Asian hate  Why societies continue to repeat patterns when history is forgotten Aphorisms, Wisdom, and Structure How a poem by Lao Tzu shaped the structure of the novel  Lisa's lifelong fascination with aphorisms  The timeless wisdom that transcends culture and generations