Bernadette L. Shih

Bernadette Shih, author of Ling Ling: The Most Beautiful Giant Panda in the World, and Love: Leap of the Heart and a Sweet Tear, was born in China and immigrated to the United States as a young woman. She continued her education there, gaining a BA in East Asian Studies from the University of Washington and an MA in Library and Information Science on a Harvard University Internship Program.

Bernadette has devoted much of her working life to bridging the cultural divide between her old home of China and her new, Western world through the medium of literature. She has held the post of Chinese Literature Specialist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Libraries and headed the National Science Foundation project for that library in conjunction with the Yenching Library of Harvard University.

Bernadette is the author of several Chinese children's stories which have been published in the United States. Her other publications include adult non-fiction, fiction and poetry. Her most recent project is Good Friends.

A member of the Authors Guild, The Academy of American Poets, The American Association of University Women and The International Society of Poets, Bernadette lives with her husband William on the beautiful Palos Verdes Peninsula in southern California.