Rita Zoey Chin is the author of the widely praised memoir, Let the Tornado Come. She holds an MFA from the University of Maryland and is the recipient of a Katherine Anne Porter Prize, an Academy of American Poets Award, and a Bread Loaf scholarship. She has taught at Towson University and at Grub Street in Boston. Her work has appeared in Guernica,Tin House, and Marie Claire. This is her first novel.
[an] imaginative debut... - The New York Times Chin (Let the Tornado Come, 2014) delivers an endearing protagonist whose epic quest ends with a measure of closure and wonder about the magic embedded in the unknown. - Booklist, STARRED review Chin has a sure hand in showing Leah's transformation as she processes her childhood neglect and learns to open up...[she] reaches some admirable heights. - Publishers Weekly Piling revelations atop otherworldly descriptions, the novel wields its uncanny enigmas in an unapologetic fashion...The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern is an enchanting novel that embraces all of the magic that the world has to offer. - Foreword Reviews There is much to admire about the author's glittering imagination...traveling with Leah Fern and seeing the world through the eyes of an empath are enjoyable. - Kirkus Reviews Rita Zoey Chin's new novel is a beautiful, haunting tale... - CrimeReads The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern is a bittersweet and achingly tender coming of age novel. Like V. E. Schwab and Audrey Niffenegger, Rita Zoey Chin is an expert guide to that territory in which magic, loss, and possibility change not only the characters but the reader, too. - Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble A book that captures such tenderness and longing, and one where the rhythm and enchantment of every sentence lures a reader into joining Leah's search, with plenty of rewards along the way. - Aimee Bender, national bestselling author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake To read The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern is to be transported into a world so luminescent and full of wonder, so infused with sorrow and hope and joy and magic, that I wish I could send a copy to everyone on Earth. Rita Zoey Chin's captivating debut novel is the best kind of enchantment--transformative and moving and full of untold delights. - Catherine Chung, Author of Forgotten Country and The Tenth Muse I was enchanted by this exquisitely written book and the fierce and lovable Leah Fern. Suffused with magic and longing, the novel casts its own tender and solitary light, as if etched on a frozen lake under a full moon. [Its strange glow won't quickly be forgotten.] - Sharon Guskin, author of The Forgetting Time