By Nghi VoMay 18th, 2021, 4:43 pm As I’m writing this, there’s a stack of sixteen ARCs of The Chosen and the Beautiful on the windowsill next to me, and it tells me two things. First, Tordotcom Publishing assumes that I know way more people than I actually do, and second, at some point in the last few years, I wrote a book, something that can actually be seen and touched. There’s a material reality to the ARCs as they sit next to me in a pile that’s taller than my cat. If I’m honest, it makes me a little nervous. It’s not like the story of queer Vietnamese-American Jordan Baker wasn’t real for me before this. I wrote Jordan’s story in four frenetic months in 2019 during a spate of family events and travel. Nothing’s quite as real as what you manage to produce desperately at a diner inside a casino at around four in the morning.