STATURE IS POWER
Bespoke biographies that establish a person’s place in the world.
Metro Writers is an international biography production house turning distinguished lives into books that confer lasting stature for legacy, for prestige, and for the permanent record.
Every culture has a word for personal standing. In Māori, it is mana. In Chinese, 面子 — mianzi. In Arabic, وجاهة — wajāha. In Vietnamese, thể diện. In English, we call it gravitas.
In an age when most media is swiped away within seconds, one form still confers that gravitas: the printed book. Nothing communicates status, relevance and credibility so immediately or for so long.
Our work is rooted in an understanding of the ancient traditions of gravitas that run deep in Asian cultures. We bring together a network of professional writers, editors and storytellers to produce books that confer lasting stature on the people they are written about, whether for business purposes, for the general public, or to preserve family stories and traditions.
Why do people commission a biography?
Every book we produce begins with a purpose
Most fall into one of three
I
Legacy
For the story that must be told before it is lost.
A life fully lived deserves more than fading memory. Whether you are preserving the history of a parent or grandparent, recording a family’s journey across generations, or setting down an account of events that shaped a nation, a Legacy biography ensures that story travels far into the future – long after those who lived it are gone.
Your history, bound and permanent.
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II
Stature
For the authority that must be established.
Bespoke biographies written about business figures change the way the world sees both them and the company behind them. In boardrooms, at investor meetings, across international markets, a book instantly communicates standing without a word spoken. Unlike a digital campaign, it does not expire. Its effect on the perceived and measurable financial value of a business can be profound and lasting.
Your leadership, established in print.
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III
Influence
For the audience that already exists.
Some bespoke biographies are written to be bought, read and celebrated. For artists, performers, cultural figures and those who have built a genuine following, a commercially produced biography is both a career milestone and a revenue-generating cultural product that deepens the connection between a public figure and the audience that has grown around them.
Your story, ready for the world.
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What a book can do
How Books Can Make a Difference
People write books for many reasons. The effects can reach beyond their expectations.
The Coffee Queen Who Conquered Dubai
Le Hoang Diep Thao – Stature
When Vietnamese businesswoman Le Hoang Diep Thao arrived in Dubai to break into the Middle Eastern coffee trade, she faced two immediate obstacles: a saturated market with no appetite for Vietnamese robusta coffee, and a business culture that was reluctant to take a woman seriously at the negotiating table.
She brought something with her that changed the dynamic entirely. A book – her biography, The Queen of King Coffee – produced by Metro Writers and launched at the Vietnamese Pavilion of Dubai Expo 2020. At every meeting, she placed a copy in front of the people across the table.
The effect was immediate. The book communicated her standing before she spoke a word. Distributors who had been dismissive became attentive. A container of King Coffee products arrived in Dubai port by the end of the first week. Significant distribution deals were signed. The book generated fifty media placements across the UAE and coverage in the United States.
A digital marketing campaign could not have achieved this. A book did.
The Executive Who Wrote Her Way In
Fyiona Yong – Stature
Fyiona Yong was Royal Dutch Shell’s worldwide youngest Head of Customer Operations – Malaysian-born, raised in Germany, building her career in Hong Kong. As a third-culture Millennial woman in a conservative industry, she found that her social media presence, however carefully managed, did nothing to establish her authority in the upper echelons of corporate life.
Working with Metro Writers, she channelled her coaching insights and lived experience into a biography that examined intergenerational bias in corporations and offered a framework for those who struggle to fit the mould to not just survive but thrive. The book was called How to Thrive as a Misfit.
When Fyiona relocated to Malaysia, the book preceded her. It established her reputation before she arrived, and factored directly in an invitation to deliver a TEDx talk in Johor Bahru – opening doors to the local business community that no digital campaign could have unlocked.
Her book didn’t just describe her authority. It proved it.
The Designer Who Claimed His Place in History
Vo Viet Chung – Legacy
As a young fashion student, Vo Viet Chung travelled deep into the Mekong Delta in search of a lost tradition. He found elderly weavers who still remembered how to produce mac nua, a remarkable Vietnamese ebony silk that grows darker and richer the longer it is worn. Chung recovered that tradition, built his career upon it, and introduced mac nua to the international fashion world as a distinctly Vietnamese material.
Decades later, others began telling a different version of that story.
To mark his 25th anniversary in the industry and set the historical record permanently in place, Chung worked with Metro Writers to produce a biography documenting his life’s work and his role in recovering a piece of Vietnamese cultural heritage. The book was celebrated at a five-star event attended by the fashion elite – designers, supermodels, media figures and cultural luminaries, culminating in a traditional fashion show.
Some bespoke biographies perform vital work in recording and owning history before the world forgets.
The Marketer Who Practised What He Preached
Quan Vo – Influence
Quan Vo understood marketing. As the owner of a successful agency in Vietnam, he knew better than most how to build a brand, generate attention and convert interest into business. He also understood the limitations of digital campaigns: the fleeting impressions, the algorithmic dependency, the diminishing returns.
So when it came time to demonstrate his digital marketing savvy, he chose to deliberately reveal its limitations by writing a book.
Profit-Driven Digital Marketing, produced with Metro Writers, distilled his professional expertise into a commercially published volume that achieved bestseller status on Amazon through the same marketing strategies he advocates for his clients. The book established him as a recognised authority in his field not just in Vietnam, but internationally – and transformed him into an in-demand speaker at industry events, sharing insights with audiences who accepted his publishing credentials as the mark of a genuine expert.
Powerful digital marketing is only truly effective when it communicates something real. Quan Vo demonstrated exactly that.
The Stories of Our People
diplomatic volume NZ & VN – LEGACY
The 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Vietnam and New Zealand presented Metro Writers with an unusual brief: produce a volume worthy of the occasion, but make it human. Standard political commemoration books fill their pages with statistics, ministerial photographs, and trade data. The National Political Publishing House – Vietnam’s largest state publisher, with a tradition of producing landmark diplomatic volumes – was open to something different.
The concept was to interview fifty people whose lives had been personally shaped by the connection between the two countries: Vietnamese students who had studied in New Zealand, New Zealand volunteers who had worked in Vietnam, diplomats, doctors, artists, entrepreneurs, and diaspora families. Together, these fifty accounts constitute a kind of living archive, the kind of document that political milestones rarely produce, because governments record policy but not experience.
Michael Arnold, a New Zealander who has spent more than a decade in Ho Chi Minh City, led the writing in collaboration with Jamille Tran and Tuấn Anh Nguyễn. The project was supported by the New Zealand Embassy in Vietnam and the Vietnamese Embassy in New Zealand, and carries an introduction from Ambassador Caroline Beresford and H.E. Mr Phan Minh Giang.
This book preserves the meaning behind policy, told by the people whose lives the relationship has actually changed.
The Writers
A great biography begins with a talented writer
Metro Writers works with a carefully selected network of partner writers, including journalists, authors, editors and storytellers whose careers span some of the most respected publications and literary projects in Asia and beyond. Each brings their own voice, expertise and body of published work to the books we produce together.
Our partner writers have contributed to esteemed publications such as Tatler, Marie Claire, Forbes, L’Officiel, Harper’s Bazaar, The Business Times, Bloomberg, and the New Zealand Herald, among others. Their books span celebrity biography, war memoir, fashion, cuisine, fiction and life writing, produced to international publishing standards in English, Vietnamese and other languages.
When you commission a biography through Metro Writers, we match you with the writer or writing team best suited to your story. You’ll work with an author who understand your world, your voice, and what your book needs to achieve.
THE BOOKS
We build gravitas and legacy for our esteemed clients
Metro Writers and our partners have produced, collaborated on, and contributed to more than thirty published volumes. These include biographies, memoirs, life writing and commercially released titles created for private clients, public figures and cultural institutions across Asia and beyond.
Some are available internationally through Amazon and other major booksellers. Others were produced for private circulation and placed directly in the hands of the people they were written for.
Each began with a decision to commit a story to print.
Begin the conversation
Tell us about your book
Every book we have produced began with a single conversation. This was often with someone who had been thinking about the idea for years, but was not quite sure where to begin.
There is no obligation and no pressure. We will listen to what you have in mind, ask a few questions, and give you a clear picture of what a book project might look like in your particular situation. The process, the timeline, and the investment involved.
If it feels right, we take it from there. If not, you will at least leave with a clearer sense of what your story deserves.
We work with clients across Asia and internationally. Enquiries are welcome in English, Vietnamese and Chinese.