Shan Rao (she/her) is a second generation Indian American writer raised in rural Minnesota. Her work has been published in (un)common sense and The Comma and has won the Margaret Lamb Writing to the Right-Hand Margin Award and Suzanna Cohen Legacy Prize. She is part of Fordham University’s class of 2022 and currently lives in NYC with her two cats.
As a second generation Asian American, I was immediately drawn to the epistolary form of Victoria Chang's stunning new collection, Dear Memory. Chang’s letters speak often across generations — both into the past of her family’s immigrant history and into the future of what she wishes for her daughters. Interspersed with the letters are images of photos and documents — often related to her parents and grandparents — that she interrupts with cutouts and pieces of handwritten text.