A lyrical memoir inspired by a voice
from 9,000 miles away
Releasing July 2026
Inspiration drifts like an untethered wind, moving to rhythms only it knows — everywhere and nowhere all at once.
Yet when it finally lands, it roots us in a place alive with unimagined possibilities.
The Power of Saying Yes
Inspiration from 9,000 Miles Away is a story about saying yes to inspiration, rediscovering who we are meant to be, and finding life lessons in the quiet, steadfast wisdom of food.
I Didn’t Expect to Write
Again
My first book, Fortune in Your Cookies, was named one of 2002’s Top Ten Nonfiction Debuts by BookBrowse. It was an honor I carried with me. Yet not long after, I stepped away from writing for myself. That book became the last one I would write for twenty‑three years.
Part of that silence came from life’s natural pull — motherhood, work, and the quiet responsibilities that filled the hours and the seasons. But a larger part came from within. I did not allow myself to believe I was a good enough writer.
An Improbable Gift
Before I knew his name or understood his story, a voice at 5 a.m. reached across 9,000 miles and led me back to a dream I had stepped away twenty-three years earlier. In that still hour, I picked up my pen and began to write again.
I did not know it then, but that improbable spark would become the first page of a book, and with it, the return of my own voice.
A Resilient Cuisine
Before the silence, I wrote. During the silence, I cooked. For decades, food became my language of care — a way to reflect, to make sense of what I could not yet put into words. When inspiration unexpectedly found me, it felt natural to let food carry the story.
From 9,000 miles away comes Macanese cuisine, shaped by centuries of movement, memory, and resilience — born of convergence, borrowed spices, and local hands, altered not for novelty but for love and survival.
As an immigrant, I recognized myself in that history — in the way flavor adapts without forgetting, in how tradition bends but does not break, and in learning when to yield and when to stand firm.
Life Lessons Learned
Food is the world’s most accessible teacher — patient, generous, always within reach.
Writing this book reminded me of something I have known all my life: food is never just food. It holds history. It carries meaning. It is, at its heart, an act of love.
Through its gentle guidance, food became the language through which I recognized the lessons life had been offering all along — lessons about patience, resilience, and the slow, transformative work of becoming who we are meant to be.
Inspiration moves softly,
like a newborn’s breath.
Quiet.
Delicate.
Deeply transformative.
It flickers,
a glimpse divine,
a whisper in time.
Grace sprinkles the air,
spiraling with flair.
Fleeting.
Empowering.
It enlivens us,
energizes us.
Toward possibilities,
toward what we become.
For me,
that arrival came
as a frequency.
His voice traveled
across continents,
until it somehow
tuned into mine.
Closing Reflection
Dreams do not expire. They simply rest, waiting for the moment we are ready to return to them. For me, it took one unexpected voice, drifting through the dark, to call mine back into the world.
Wherever you are on your path, may my story offer companionship and gently help you reconnect with your dreams.
