Brian Tashima

Brian Tashima was born and raised in Hawaii and has been a resident of Vancouver, Washington since 2000. He has two autistic kids and was himself diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum in 2025. He started writing the Joel Suzuki series (originally the Spectraland Saga) in 2011 after his oldest child requested that he write him a book.

In addition to being an author, Brian is a screenwriter, filmmaker, musician, creator, consultant, and philanthropist. He is the managing general partner of Second Player Score, a punk rock band and multimedia production team, and his other creative credits include a manga-style comic book series called Glorified and a short film titled Hold My Beer.

Brian also serves on the Board of Directors for Autism Empowerment, a nonprofit organization devoted to enriching the lives of people from the autism and neurodivergent communities, and is a contributing editor for the organization's Spectrum Life Magazine publication.