Bio

J.A. Yang was born in Taipei and came-of-age in San Diego. He has authored a few books, been published online here and there, and podcasts when the mood strikes. His favorite font is Enviro.

You can reach him at digitaljon(at)gmail.com.

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Introduction: Jace

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What is this and who is "Jace?" With 2025 starting up, I’ve decided it’s time to return to the world of online writing. At first I was exploring alternative options, such as Instagram or creating another newsletter. However, there are major downsides to both. Instagram is primarily a visual medium and text posts on there are limited to 2,200 characters, which is just around 400 words. That’s enough for some things but not nearly enough for longer pieces—which sometimes I’d like to do. So Instagram was out. Newsletters are fun and I even now have a separate email address specificially for subscribing to them—an idea I strongly encourage you to try—but I like being able to just link to a post in my archives if needed Plus I'm sure nobody wants me to flood their inboxes. Also, there’s some debate on whether using the industry standard, Substack, is moral or not. Additionally, with Mailchimp's Tiny Letter service now discontinued, I just didn’t have the heart to start ano...
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Books: Second Quarter Review

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This was supposed to be the year of “let’s read more fiction books!” So far it’s shaping up to be a losing effort. But enthusiasm remains high and summer is around the corner! Books Read, Fiction Babel, R.F. Kuang ⭐ Homeseeking, Karissa Chen ⭐ Jade City, Fonda Lee ⭐ Books Read, Non-Fiction Emergent Tokyo, Jorge Almazán, Joe McReynolds ⭐ Killers of the Flower Moon, David Grann Shattering the Glass, Pamela Grundy, Susan Shackelford ⭐ Stay True, Hua Hsu ⭐ And it’s August, which is clearly not quarter two, but there has been a lot of travel so here we are. After essentially three months away, I’m back at home and ready to cover what I’ve read in April through July. The short answer is: next to nothing! After logging six books in quarter one, I only added three more eligible books in the four months since. So um, here we go and let’s hope second summer’s ocean waves brings a lot of beach reading! Why did my friends and frenemies not tell me to read Babel sooner? My video game...
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Recommend: Cute Things as Visual Reminders

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Conflicted about what to do with all those smallish figurines collecting dust in your closet? Let's put them to work around the house! If you came over to my house and looked out the left back window, you might notice a little Donald Duck staring up at you from the corner of the windowsill. Slightly sun faded, the rubber figurine is about half an inch tall and instead of legs, has a suction cup body from the chest down. Unlike his irascible and anxious cartoon self, this Donald is calm and serene, which enables him to do an important job: providing a gentle reminder to not pull down the window shades in order for morning sunlight to stream through to the house plants located on our kitchen floor. That reminder is for me, or for the cleaners, or for any house guests. “Do not close these blinds!” There are other figurines dotting the rest of the house as well, each of them given specific jobs. Hangyodon comes out onto the bathroom counter as a reminder to close the small shower wind...
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