Something Inside Me Knows: a Memoir

National Book Award winner and New York Times bestseller Malinda Lo delivers an inspiring memoir in verse about losing her language, finding her voice, and honoring her ancestors.

In 1978, when Malinda Lo was three years old, she sat on her white American-born grandmother’s lap in a wheelchair as her father pushed them across a wooden bridge out of the People’s Republic of China. She does not remember the crossing that redefined her life; she has only been told the story.

In her debut memoir Lo connects her childhood in Colorado to her grandmother’s experiences in wartime China to her life as an acclaimed author. Through free verse, found poetry, and historical documents, Something Inside Me Knows excavates the tangled roots of Lo’s identity and heritage, exposing the unspoken traumas and narratives that shape us—even if we can’t remember them.