“It may take time, but dreams can come true.” This speaks to Hui Zhou, a bilingual nonfiction writer with a long career in natural science.
Born, educated, worked, married, became a mother and a respected senior scientist in her home city Beijing, Hui created her next opportunity to Canada. In the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia, she researched in her favourite field, entomology and obtained a Master of Science Degree, dreamed for a long time, from Saint Mary’s University in Halifax.
Still, Hui explores wider in science, but she never stops writing that had been one of her hobbies for most of her life. Since 2016, she has focused more on writing, one more dream come true.
Many of her nonfiction stories have been published in print and heard on radio broadcast since the 1990’s. Her latest publications include, Grandpa Santa, published in The Chronicle Herald and three other Atlantic daily newspapers on a same day, December 3, 2021. It was about how her daughter at six excitedly learned about Christmas in her birth country where Christmas has never been a holiday. Over the SandBar was published by The Masthead News 2025 (October Issue). A Glance at an Old Newspaper, about how Hui “ran into” the history of the Halifax Explosion, was published on Blood & Bourbon Magazine, Issue #15, 2025. It was also named as a Finalist in 2025 Next Generation Short Story Awards.
Running Wild with Bossy Boy (2018) is Hui’s first nonfiction photograph-storybook for children about a flock of free-run backyard chickens, focusing on their different personalities, or to them, chicken-alities. Children can easily understand chicken’s personalities, learn the biology through the interesting stories and imagine how happy the chickens are when running freely.
In Hui’s second nonfiction photograph-storybook, Puppy Oland (2023), children will meet the lively dog Oland and discover what Oland liked at his puppy training, if Oland was a good swimmer, how many corn ears Oland retrieved from neighboring campers, whom Oland once badly offended . . .
The success, in writing, photographing, book design, self-publishing, marketing and much more, encourages Hui’s further works to participate in nonfiction contests or awards.
Hui loves animals, including insects that she has studied and especially now speaking for about their beauty, their irreplaceable importance to the ecosystem and their dramatic population decline because of human activities.
Gardening, a heritage from her grandpa, remains her favorite pastime.
