Elaine Russell is the award-winning author of two adult novels, Across the Mekong River (French edition De l’autre côté du Mékong) and In the Company of Like-Minded Women, as well as six children’s books. She has been writing for over twenty-five years, drawing upon her love of history and traveling to other countries to learn about their cultures and past. She lives in Sacramento, California, with her husband.
Laos is a country dear to Elaine’s heart, and she has visited many times. She served for six years on the board of the U.S.-based nonprofit Legacies of War, which advocates for increased funding for the clearance of unexploded bombs. Illegal U.S. bombing in Laos during the Vietnam War left over 80 million unexploded cluster bombs that continue to kill and maim civilians fifty years later. She authored two essays on the history of this aftermath published in anthologies: Southeast Asia, The United States, and Historical Memory (Haymarket Books, June 2019) and Interactions with a Violent Past: Reading Post-Conflict Landscapes in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam (Singapore: NUS Press, 2013).