Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai is the author of two international bestsellers, The Mountains Sing (Algonquin Books, 2020) and Dust Child (Algonquin Books, 2023), the poetry collection The Secret of Hoa Sen (BOA Editions, 2010), and eight books in Vietnamese. She has won the Poetry of the Year 2010 Award from the Hà Nội Writers Association, the 2021 PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award, the 2020 Lannan Literary Award Fellowship, the International Book Awards, and the BookBrowse Best Debut Award, and she was runner-up for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Her writing has been translated into more than twenty-five languages. Quế Mai is the Peace Ambassador for PeaceTrees Vietnam and Author Ambassador for Room to Read. She has a PhD in creative writing and was named by Forbes Vietnam as one of twenty inspiring women of 2021.