Skip to main content  Interview: December 18, 2009  December 18,
2009  In this interview with's Norah Piehl, Janice Y. K. Lee
discusses the slow evolution of her debut novel, THE PIANO
TEACHER, from its origins as a short story and explains some of
the challenges she faced in creating characters with backgrounds
differing greatly from her own. She also describes the research
she performed to accurately capture life in post-World War II
Hong Kong, reflects on the struggles of balancing her writing
career with her home life as a mother of four, and shares some
of her favorite contemporary novelists. What was the starting
point for your debut novel, THE PIANO TEACHER? Did you get the
idea for the characters and their relationships first? The plot?
The setting? How did you develop these ideas in preparation for
writing the novel?  Janice Y. K. Lee: THE PIANO TEACHER started
as a short story about Claire and Locket, although I didn't know
their names at the time. I had an idea for a story about an
English woman in