Woman reading from notes at a microphone on a dimly lit brick-walled stage before a seated audience.

Time Beings: Essays on Trees, Time, and Taiwan

Time, Being: Essays on Trees, Time, and Taiwan is joyce’s memoir-in-essays, a collection of eight lyric essays and five shorter pieces otherwise known as interludes.

Silhouette of a person facing the ocean during a golden sunset

The book examines what it means to embody two sets of values that are often at odds with one another — the American ideals of independence and self-fulfillment and the Taiwanese values of family, community, and sacrifice — as experienced through different modes of time perception.

Each of the larger essays revolves around a different family member as a way to explore a concept tied to either my Taiwanese or my American heritage: silence, cyclical time, or return as ritual, for instance.

The collection is ultimately about what it means to be a child of immigrants in America, and it considers the sacrifices and gains of the previous generation, as they so often didn’t have the language or the time to record their own experiences.

The essay, “Mother, Time,” from joyce’s manuscript was published in Slant’d.

Illustrated magazine spread titled “Mother, Time.” showing a woman standing on a beach beside a sleeping child, with palm trees, ocean waves, clouds, flowers, and accompanying essay text.

"Joyce explores universal truths through intimate family stories. She is a painter in the medium of memories — creating layered human portraits, looping textures of time, and strokes of emotion that resonate long past every period.”

—Jen Soriano, author of Nervous: Essays on Heritage
"Whenever I’m in the same room as Joyce, I always deeply feel her heart and mind. She asks questions that push me to think more intentionally about my work and my place in the world. She also pays attention to people as much as she does ideas, noticing and making sure I am supported both inside and outside my residency sessions. I am so grateful to have Joyce as a facilitator and mentor."

— T. De Los Reyes, Narrative Shifts digital resident

Grateful for support from these foundations and residencies for the manuscript:

Time Beings: Essays on Trees, Time, and Taiwan

Time, Being: Essays on Trees, Time, and Taiwan is joyce’s memoir-in-essays, a collection of eight lyric essays and five shorter pieces otherwise known as interludes.

The book examines what it means to embody two sets of values that are often at odds with one another — the American ideals of independence and self-fulfillment and the Taiwanese values of family, community, and sacrifice — as experienced through different modes of time perception.

"Joyce explores universal truths through intimate family stories. She is a painter in the medium of memories — creating layered human portraits, looping textures of time, and strokes of emotion that resonate long past every period.”