“Writing is, by its nature, interior work. So being forced to be around people is a great gift for a novelist. You get to be reminded, daily, of how people think, how they speak, how they live; the things they worry about, the things they hope for, the things they fear.”

American novelist, editor, and travel writer

Hanya Yanagihara is an American novelist, editor, and travel writer. She grew up in Hawaii and is known for her fiction and editorial work. She is best known for the bestselling novel A Little Life, which was shortlisted for the 2015 Booker Prize. Yanagihara also served as editor-in-chief of T Magazine, and her work has reached readers through both long-form fiction and magazine writing.