Cherylene Lee is a Chinese-American writer whose family has been in the United States since the 1850s. Lee was born and raised in Los Angeles, California, and began appearing in television shows and stage plays at a young age. She is the author of stories, poems, and numerous plays including Carry the Tiger to the Mountain and Arthur and Leila. Lee holds a degree in paleontology from the University of California-Berkeley and a degree in geology from UCLA. Here, Lee responds to some questions about this story and about her writing career.

How did you decide to write this story?

The parallel of Hollywood as a place people are drawn to and the La Brea Tar Pits as a place that animals were drawn to, and my own interest in finding parallels between science, art, and entertainment, are the reasons the story has its peculiar structure. I wrote this story to connect different parts of my life—my interest in performing, which seemed very externally driven, and my interest in paleontology which, at the time, seemed like a much more internal quest.

How much of this story is based on your own experiences as a young person?

Most of the feelings are autobiographical, but actual scenes and dialogue are fictionalized.

What type of writing do you most enjoy? Why?

I mostly write plays, and while I believe that preference comes from having to learn dialogue at a very young age, I also know I enjoy the collaborative process of theater very much. As a playwright, I am one of many artists—along with actors, designers, directors, and producers—who bring words to life on the stage. While I enjoy the creative freedom of working alone (in the imagination, anything is possible), I also enjoy the immediate response of an audience.