On Oct. 31, Junior Love Dunn and her mom, Pintip Dunn, will see the release a book they co-authored. The Lotus Flower Champion–a Squid Game meets Peter Pan through Thai folktales young adult novel–will be published by Macmillan Publishing.
Alaia, a teenage girl, goes on a trip to Thailand with her family as her dying mom’s last wish, what amounts to their last hurrah. But instead of the paradise vacation they were expecting, their trip takes a turn for the worse, as their boat is hijacked by an evil scientist and they are whisked away to a remote island. The island looks like paradise but feels like hell. The scientist holds a group of ten strangers captive to experiment on them and try to bring their latent psychic abilities, rooted in Thai folktales, to the surface. Alaia’s mom only has days left to live, her dad has gone missing, and no one can be trusted. It’s all up to her now. Can she find a way to save her family and herself or will they all disappear forever?
The inspiration for this story was sparked by the disappearance of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, an international passenger flight that disappeared from the radar on March 8, 2014, and vanished into the Indian Ocean. Although originally Pintip’s idea, once Love got involved, the story was transformed. Love worked to develop the main character, a biracial teenage girl with OCD, as she felt they shared a lot of the same experiences. The mother-daughter relationship in the story was also very important to Love and Pintip, as they felt very connected to the characters. Love explained that her mom is “the one here guiding me, and I love working with her. She’s taught me so much about how to be an author and write stories.”
Overall, Pintip describes the experience of working with her daughter as “fun, having someone to bounce ideas off of, and especially someone who can bring in the teenage perspective,” but the process was not without its challenges. Pintip says her main challenge was remembering when to be Love’s mom and when to be her colleague. As a co-author, she had to remember to “respect her equally and not be the mom and be like, ‘I need you to do this right now’.” Another challenge that presented itself was their difference of ideas. Love turned to her mom and explained that, “since you are an author, if we have creative differences, I see your opinion as a little bit higher than mine.” Nevertheless, the positives of having a co-author far outweighed the negatives. Love explains, “Throughout the whole process, we’ve worked really well to compromise with each other and come up with a book that we’re both really happy with.”
The Lotus Flower Champion will be the first time this mother-daughter duo has published a book together, but neither of them are newcomers to the craft of storytelling. Pintip Dunn is a New York Times bestselling author of young adult fiction as well as a two-time RITA® award winner. Pintip has explored many genres through her writing including science fiction, thriller, and rom-coms; but this book will be her first paranormal story. Love Dunn is no amateur writer herself. In fact she wrote the entire first draft of the book on her own. Her love for writing grew through joining the NaNoWriMo club in fourth grade, a program that challenges people to write 50,000 words throughout the month of November. While this is her first published book, she has written 14 manuscripts.
As the release date, Oct. 31, approaches, Pintip and Love find their days filled with interviews and other press in order to generate more publicity for their book. On Nov. 1, the mother-daughter pair will speak on air with Great Day Washington (WUSA 9) from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. Their official launch party will take place on Nov. 4 at 7 P.M. at the Barnes and Nobles Rockville location. Come out to support your fellow Baron and to congratulate Love and Pintip on this huge accomplishment!
