GREEN ISLAND Author Shawna Yang Ryan on Tour

SHAWNA YANG RYAN is a former Fulbright scholar and the author of the novel GREEN ISLAND, a stunning story of love, betrayal, and family, set against the backdrop of a changing Taiwan over the course of the twentieth century. She authored a previous novel, Water Ghosts, and teaches in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa. Her short fiction has appeared in ZYZZYVA, The Asian American Literary Review, Kartika Review, and The Berkeley Fiction Review. We've been…

228 and the Power of Storytelling

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="735"] "For those of us who remember that every struggle is for a glory beyond our own." Drawing by Leona Chen, December 2015[/caption] (Amma, I may be studying Walt Whitman, but I am writing my way back to you.) I was born in 1996, the year of Taiwan’s first direct presidential election. Exactly two decades later, we have named the first woman president of Taiwan (and the second female head of state in the history of East Asia). And while we have tremendous…

GREEN ISLAND – A New Novel by Shawna Yang Ryan

A stunning story of love, betrayal, and family, set against the backdrop of a changing Taiwan over the course of the twentieth century. February 28, 1947. Trapped inside their home due to an uprising that has rocked Taipei, Dr. Tsai delivers his youngest daughter, the unnamed narrator of Green Island. A few days later, he is one of the many thousands of people dragged away from their families. Missing for a decade, he eventually returns a haunted man. Feeling a stranger in the midst of his…

Reexamining Taiwan’s 228 Massacre: A Discussion on the U.S. Role in Taiwan Then and Now

The Human Rights for Taiwanese organization in Seattle made a great and detailed transcript of their 2/28 Event held at the University of Washington. Participating on the panel is Jonathan Manthorpe, author of Forbidden Nation: A History of Taiwan and International Affairs columnist for the Vancouver Sun; Dr. Sam Small, Vice-Chairman of the Taiwan Veterans Badge of Honor Association; and Bryan Chou, second-generation Taiwanese-American, active in the Taiwanese-American community and in the group,…