L-word: You said during the Q&A that you don’t edit until you finish your writing. How do you have a discipline not to edit when you stop for the night and have to re-read what you wrote the day before?

TG: I just keep on writing. If I made a drastic change in the story, for instance when a man suddenly becomes a woman, I just write a little sticky and I just stick it there and I just say, “Go back and change this.” I keep notes to myself about what needs to be fixed later on. If the story suddenly takes a surprising turn or I realize I have to go back and change things, I just mention that to myself.

L-word: Your last book, “The Silent Girl”, was based in Chinatown in Boston. How much of that was influenced by your own experiences as a child and your heritage?

TG: That one was very greatly influenced because I grew up as Asian-American in pretty much a white neighborhood. This whole sense of being an outsider, of trying to always fit in, of trying to be accepted as an American, and that comes in “The Silent Girl”. Also what comes in are the fairytales my mother told me. I grew up with Monkey King that was a big part of Asian culture. It’s one of these weird heroes that we have and my mother also believed in ghosts, sort of this idea that all around us are spirits, all around us our ancestors are watching. That all fit in to “The Silent Girl”.