About the Author

(More) About Cynthia:

Cynthia was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, Canada to immigrant parents from Hong Kong. As a child, the first language she learned was NOT English, but Cantonese. In fact, she didn’t speak much English, if at all (beyond knowing the words to “Do-Re-Mi” and “So Long, Farewell” from The Sound of Music (which to this day remains her favourite movie)), until she started Junior Kindergarten at the age of four! She learned very quickly, however. These days, English is her default and primary language.

As a child, Cynthia loved to sing, draw and play piano. She also was involved with many other extra-curricular activities, including Girl Guides and tennis. She lived in Bermuda for a year when she was in Grade 7 and then came back to Toronto for the rest of middle and high school. She attended the Bishop Strachan School, where she sang in the school choir and was involved with theatre. She later majored in drama and history at Queen’s University.

Cynthia is now married and a mom to one little boy. As part of an interfaith AND interethnic family, Cynthia, her husband and her son celebrate holidays from their respective cultural backgrounds as well as “general” Canadian holidays. This means that just like Tory and Andy, the family celebrates Lunar New Year, Rosh Hashanah and “calendar” New Year. They too have their unique traditions! However, instead of making pizza on December 31, they order takeout from an Indian restaurant!

On Why She Wrote Our Three New Years!:

There’s a general lack of books featuring families that are both interfaith and interethnic. So far, I can only think on ONE, which I learned about in an interfaith group I’m part of on social media! And the ones about cultural holidays tend not to have unique traditions that don’t follow the ‘general’ customs. For example, you’d very unlikely find a story about Lunar New Year where the family might eat noodles with sauce made out of, say, Greek yogurt. Or maybe using buttons instead of chocolate for gelt when playing dreidel at Chanukah. I wanted to put an element of authenticity in it, because every family is different and each have their own traditions that might be different or adapted. Not everyone keeps the same customs as what was done in their family’s ancestral homelands.