Jessica J. Lee

Jessica J. Lee is a British and Canadian author, environmental historian.

Biography
Lee was born in Canada, to a Welsh father and a Taiwanese mother. She was brought up in Canada, lived in London and Berlin.

She received her BA from University of King's College in Halifax, her MA from University of London. She then received her PhD in Environmental History and Aesthetics from York University.

In 2018, Lee founded the non-fiction journal The Willowherb Review. Receiving funds from fewer than a hundred backers on the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, Lee and company paid writers and artists to produce five issues, with the project formally ending in 2022. The journal had also been funded by a grant provided by Arts Council England.

Reviewers noted that her 2019 memoir Two Trees Make a Forest incorporates elements of environmental analysis to her account of exploring Taiwan, where her mother was born. The book won the 2020 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction.

Awards
Lee won the 2019 RBC Taylor Prize for emerging authors. The prize came with $10,000 cash, and the mentorship of Kate Harris.