{"id":5296,"date":"2014-03-08T18:04:36","date_gmt":"2014-03-08T23:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/library.ryerson.ca\/asianheritage\/?page_id=5296"},"modified":"2026-04-19T11:12:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T15:12:14","slug":"doretta-lau","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/authors\/doretta-lau\/","title":{"rendered":"Doretta Lau"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Doretta Lau is a journalist and writer who was born in Burnaby, B.C. but now lives in Hong Kong.  Her journalism covers arts and culture.  Her fiction and poetry have appeared in a number of literary magazines and she is now working on a screenplay.  Her short story “How Does a Single Blade of Grass Thank the Sun?” originally published in the magazine Event<\/em> was a finalist for the Writers’ Trust of Canada \/ McClelland & Stewart Journey Prize for 2013<\/a>.  Lau studied at the University of British Columbia and completed an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Fiction (Short stories)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

How Does a Single Blade of Grass Say Thanks to the Sun?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Gibsons, BC: Nightwood Editions, 2014.
PS8623 .A8165 H69 2014<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Building on the success of the Journey Prize-shortlisted title story, the stories of How Does a Single Blade of Grass Thank the Sun?<\/em> present an updated and whimsical new take on what it means to be Canadian. Lau alludes to the personal and political histories of a number of young Asian Canadian characters to explain their unique perspectives of the world, artfully fusing pure delusion and abstract perception with heartbreaking reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Correspondingly, the book\u2019s title refers to an interview with Chinese basketball star Yao Ming, who when asked about the Shanghai Sharks, the team that shaped his formative sporting years, responded, \u201cHow does a single blade of grass thank the sun?\u201d Lau\u2019s stories feature the children and grandchildren of immigrants, transnational adoptees and multiracial adults who came of age in the 1990s\u2014all struggling to find a place in the Western world and using the only language they know to express their hopes, fears and expectations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Fiction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

We Are Underlings<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Toronto: House of Anansi Press, 2026.
forthcoming October 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Zita Chang\u2019s job\u2014marketing death for the twenty-first century\u2014is just like everyone else\u2019s entry-level position in a corporate machine. While she\u2019s grinding away, she\u2019s determined not to let her grief over the death of her father interfere with her work. But being a Nine Circles employee comes with perks: she can ask the Afterlife team to replace Siri with her dead dad\u2019s voice so that he can give her the advice she never wanted when he was alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just when Zita feels the drudgery can\u2019t get any worse, the Nine Circles calls an emergency meeting nine weeks before the park\u2019s grand opening to drop a shocking bomb: not only has their executive director died under mysterious circumstances, but Zita and her coworkers are charged with programming his reanimated body to keep the launch on schedule. Can Zita pull this off? Why have a few other colleagues recently dropped dead too? And couldn\u2019t this meeting have been an email?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Anthology<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Changing the Face of Canadian Literature<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Lau, Doretta. “At Core We Think They Will Kill Us.” In Changing the Face of Canadian Literature<\/em>, edited by Dane Swan. Toronto: Guernica Editions, 2020.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Links<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Doretta Lau personal website<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Doretta Lau Facebook page<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Publisher House of Anansi Press<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Publisher Nightwood Editions<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Doretta Lau is a journalist and writer who was born in Burnaby, B.C. but now lives in Hong Kong.  Her journalism covers arts and culture.  Her fiction and poetry have appeared in a number of literary magazines and she is … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"parent":16,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-5296","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5296"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5296\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22053,"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5296\/revisions\/22053"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/16"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.torontomu.ca\/asianheritage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}