Therese Park came to the U.S. in October of 1966 to perform with the Kansas City Philharmonic [1] (now the Kansas City Symphony) in its cello section. After 30 years, she retired and began writing fulltime. Her first novel A Gift of the Emperor (published by Spinsters Ink, 1997) deals with Korean sex slaves, mostly schoolgirls, including Soon-ah, the heroin of her novel, forced into military prostitution by the Japanese military during WWII while Japan ruled most of Asia and the Pacific. Park was a featured author at three national bookfairs in 1998--the LA Bookfair, Miami Bookfair, and Heartland Bookfair. Park's second novel When a Rooster Crows at Night: A Child's Experience of the Korean War (iUniverse 2004) is based on Park's own experience as a child living through the horror of the three-year war (1950-1953), which, in a real sense, has never ended. Her third book The Northern Wind: Forced Journey to North Korea (iUniverse 2012) is told by an 18-year-old war orphan working with a group named 'Hope Community' that helped the islanders with the government's New-Village Movement on a South Korean island. One day, she accidentally stumbles across a battalion of disguised North Korean commandos in a remote area, and reports to the group commander. She becomes a South Korean spy and leaves for North Korea, with a mission to accomplish. In 2006, Park wrote Midwest Voices columns for The Kansas City Star-Opinion Page, and between 2009 and 2016, she wrote columns for the Star-Johnson County Neighborhood News. She is a mother of three daughters and a grandmother of four grandchildren born in the U.S. Links: ------ [1] https: //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_City_Symphony