Judy Zhu grew up in Beijing, China. In her late 20's, Judy quit her job in Beijing and came to Monterey, California, for graduate school. In 2002, upon her graduation she was hired as a Chinese language professor by the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLIFLC). She received tenure in 2008. She is currently working as a faculty trainer training language teachers on diagnostic assessment.
Judy began publishing her Chinese works at the age of 14. At the age of 15, she won Third Place at the International Chinese Poetry Contest and her poem Speechless Winter was published in the book International High School Chinese Poets. At the age of 17, six of her essays were included in the five-volume series of Beijing Top Ten High School Award-winning Writings. Before she came to the US for graduate school, she had won many literature awards in China and her 300 plus poems, prose and stories were published in national newspapers and magazines as well as being broadcast by national radio stations in China. She was also an invited part-time columnist for Teda Times when she worked at the US Embassy in Beijing.
Judy's first English book is Modern Chinese Cultural Encounters Volume I: Studying and Traveling in China. She is currently working on Volume II Working and Living in China, which is expcted to be published in 2012.