Yi-Hwa Bayar Hanna

I am an award-winning writer of Taiwanese and mixed Middle Eastern origin, who was born on the East Coast of the USA. I currently live in the cosmopolitan city of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, where I spent most of my childhood. 

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My career as a writer, editor, creative content manager, and multimedia journalist has spanned across the Middle East, Asia, Europe, and the USA over 15+ years, and has encompassed everything from world-leading publications and top-tier global communications firms to technology-driven start-ups. My clients and projects have ranged across a wide variety of industries, including food and beverage, health and fitness, travel, fashion and beauty, lifestyle, government, events, and technology. I've written everything from articles and blogs to speeches, scripts, and more. I've worked on video production, photoshoots, and social media, as well as print and digital publishing, for both editorial and sponsored content. I've also worked with television, live radio, and events, on collaborations with international brands. My work in creative marketing has included everything from copywriting to the conception and development of campaign ideas. 

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I have held roles such as Editor-in-Chief of the award-winning Women's Health (Middle East edition), Deputy Editor of Good Housekeeping (Middle East edition) - the most trusted magazine brand in the world, and Features Editor of VIVA magazine, the largest-selling women's monthly title in the GCC. My work has been published in a number of prominent publications, including multiple international editions of Women’s Health and Good Housekeeping, Men’s Health, Grazia, Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar, VIVA, The Inertia, The Gulf Today, Etihad Inflight, What’s On, Goodness, Spinneys Media, and FitWild, to name a few. If you'd like to know more about my career and qualifications, you can visit my LinkedIn profile here.

An artist, a keen traveller and foodie, and an advocate for living a healthy lifestyle, I am also a certified group fitness trainer, and accredited sound healing, mindfulness, and meditation teacher. I embrace life by finding a balance between my sense of adventure and my love for tranquility, and I celebrate that which awakens my creativity and excites my soul. 

 

As an author, I am currently looking for representation for my first novel, The Children of Numen: a speculative fiction story with science-fiction elements, set in a futuristic utopia where negative emotions are outlawed. For this novel, I won an award in the first-ever global standard writers' fellowship in the Middle East for fiction writers, run by the Emirates Literature Foundation. I am also currently working on my second novel, The Casting Season: a fantasy story inspired by East Asian mythology, about love, youth, and what it really means to live forever. I am extremely proud that this novel was awarded first place in the Emirates Literature Festival Writing Prize 2023.  

In case you're wondering, "Yi-Hwa" is pronounced like "Eva" but with a "w" instead of the "v". Don't worry if you get it wrong the first time - even Autocorrect changes my name to "Highway" or "Yikes"!