[3] Thien made the decision to switch from dance to creative writing for a few reasons, but mainly due to the fact that she felt inadequate in talent, despite her passion for the art.

[8] Thien's debut novel, Certainty (Toronto: M&S, 2006; New York: Little, Brown, 2007; London: Faber, 2007), follows a documentary producer as she searches for the truth about her father's experience living in Japanese-occupied Malaysia.

[10] Her second novel, Dogs at the Perimeter (Toronto: M&S, 2011; London: Granta Books, 2012), is about associates at Montreal's Brain Research Centre and their traumatic ties to the Cambodian genocide.

Her latest novel, Do Not Say We Have Nothing (2016), follows the life of Li-Ling, the daughter of a Chinese immigrant, as she becomes the keeper of a mysterious work, the Book of Records, following her father's suicide.

[11]In 2008, Thien was invited to participate in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa, and the IWP State Department-funded 2010 study tour of the United States, which invited eight international writers, including Kei Miller, Eduardo Halfon, Billy Kahora and Khet Mar, to explore the unresolved legacies of American history.

[15] In 2016, Thien objected to the University of British Columbia's handling of complaints made against Steven Galloway, a professor in the Creative Writing department until he was fired.

In a five-page letter, she stressed the importance of due process and asked that her name be removed from all of UBC's promotional materials.

It received the praise of Nobel Prize laureate Alice Munro, who wrote: "This is surely the debut of a splendid writer.

[21] The novel won the 2015 LiBeraturpreis, awarded by the Frankfurt Book Fair and recognizing works of fiction from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.