Author Information:

Faiza Furqan Nguyen is a "stay-at-home" mom of three "half n 'half" kids, one half Pakistani and the other Vietnamese. Both, her and her husband, are first generation immigrants to the United States of America, the land of free refills and the home of waffle fries. Even though they are both fluent in their mother tongues, hers Urdu and his Vietnamese, they can only pick out when their in-laws are talking smack about them in their respective languages. Given the dynamics of their family, English has become the primary language of their home. Naturally, they get compliments like, "mixed kids are so beautiful!" Such compliments generally follow the question whether their kids can speak all three languages ​​they are exposed to? They regretfully answer, "they can barely speak one." It's this very question that made the author write a dual language (English and Urdu) book for young readers. The inspiration drew grand from their beloved fur baby, the black cat named, Simba. Through her authorship, she hopes to promote the practice of reading to children as early as infancy or even sooner by their loved ones. Additionally, she hopes to promote a healthy dialogue about diversity with little ones by acknowledging that even though we might look or speak differently, we are also similar in many ways. Because diversity is a beautiful thing that should be embraced.