Beautiful Country

About the author:

Qian Julie was born in Shijiazhuang, China. At age 7, she moved to Brooklyn, New York, with her parents. For five years thereafter, the three lived in the shadows of undocumented life in New York City. Qian Julie's first book is a poignant literary memoir that follows the family through those years, as they grappled with poverty, manual labor in sweatshops, lack of access to medical care, and the perpetual threat of deportation.

A graduate of Yale Law School and Swarthmore College—where she juggled classes and extracurriculars with four part-time jobs—Qian Julie is now a litigator. She wrote Beautiful Country on her iPhone, during her subway commute to and from work at a national law firm, where she was elected to partnership within two years of joining the firm. She is now managing partner of Gottlieb & Wang LLP, a firm dedicated to advocating for education and civil rights. Qian Julie believes that affording underprivileged communities the type of legal representation typically reserved for wealthy corporate interests is the first step to eradicating systemic barriers.

Qian Julie’s writing has appeared in major publications such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, and she regularly speaks on issues such as immigration, education, discrimination, and economic disparity. She is the founder and leader of the Jews of Color group at Central Synagogue, where she is also member of the Racial Justice Task Force and the social justice reform leadership. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and their two rescue dogs, Salty and Peppers.