Los Angeles-based Pier—better known as Pieretta Dawn—is a best selling author, Hollywood film producer and underwater photographer. She received national critical acclaim, at age 15, when her debut young adult novel The Mermaid Apprentices, the first of The Interspecies Trilogy, was published in 2009. She has served as Director for Development of International Content at Sony’s Columbia Pictures, and as VP of Film & TV at A-Major Media, Hollywood’s first Asian/Asian-American drive production company. As literary Brand Ambassador for Bangkok Metropolitan/UNESCO, she has spoken at TEDx events and international book fairs. A recipient of the Outstanding Youth Award, she was shortlisted for the SEA Write Young Writers Award. Pier also judges film and writing competitions for USC, UCLA and the Neilson Hays Library. An avid proponent of solo female travel, she also founded Hollywood Sharks, the industry’s first scuba diving club, and leads underwater expeditions to advocate for the conservation of fragile marine ecosystems.