VANESSA CHAN is a Malaysian author. Her debut novel, The Storm We Made, has been sold in twenty languages and territories worldwide, and will publish in the US and UK in January 2024. Vanessa's other work has been published in Electric Lit, Kenyon Review, and more. She is now based mostly in Brooklyn.
Brave and immensely moving, The Storm We Made is one of the most powerful and confident debuts I've ever read. A storytelling star is born -- Tracy Chevalier In Vanessa Chan's spellbinding debut, one woman's desire to change her destiny shapes the future of a colonized nation. Combining cinematic grandeur with nuanced storytelling, The Storm We Made offers the hidden history that only fiction can reveal: the everyday yearnings of people surviving a brutal occupation, children trying to make sense of the unspeakable, and the search for love. I'll never forget this book. -- Jessamine Chan The Storm We Made is an excellent examination of the way individuals get caught in the violence of history . . . a frank book that revels in moral complexity. Lovers of Eileen Chang will especially appreciate Vanessa Chan. -- Rowan Hisayo Buchanan Devastatingly beautiful and extraordinary . . . Vanessa shines an evocative light on this piece of history. I'm going to be thinking about this one for a very long time -- Jessica George A phenomenon unto itself. This is no mere debut, but rather the summoning of a story buried so deeply in a nation that it could only surface with a talent great enough to do it justice. -- Mira Jacob Like the most dazzling historical fiction, The Storm We Made etches intimate details on an epic canvas. Vanessa Chan's characters face agonizing choices under the darkness of colonization and war, and yet she imbues them with an indelible spirit of resistance that never lets you forget the light. A fearless, gripping, morally complex story by a writer to watch. -- Dawnie Walton