This teenage rebellion was the beginning of a difficult relationship between mother and daughter. There Tan attended an expensive private school and developed a rebellious streak. When Tan was fourteen, both her brother and her father died of brain tumors, and Tan and her mother moved to Switzerland. They also hoped that she might become a surgeon or a concert pianist, but Tan knew she wanted to be a writer from the time she was eight years old, when she won an essay contest in a local newspaper. They expected me to get straight A's from the time I was in kindergarten. My parents had very high expectations, Tan said in an interview with the Academy of Achievement.

Her mother, a nurse, and her father, an electrical engineer and Baptist minister, immigrated separately from China. Tan was born on February 19, 1952, in Oakland, California. It is therefore more appropriate for older students. The Hundred Secret Senses includes sexual situations, some descriptions of war-time violence, and casual references to recreational drug use. Drawing from her personal experience allows Tan to breathe life into her characters, filling them with emotion. As an adult, Tan traveled to China with her mother after she recovered from a serious illness, much as Olivia and Kwan return to China: both Tan's and Olivia's journeys brought better understanding of cultural heritage, the importance of family, and self.

Just as Olivia in the novel learns that her father left behind a daughter when he came to America to find a better life, Tan herself learned that she had half-sisters in China. These stories were clearly significant to Tan because she includes autobiographical elements in many of her books, including The Hundred Secret Senses (1995). In an interview with the Academy of Achievement, Amy Tan tells that, when she was growing up, There was a lot of storytelling going on in our house: family stories, gossip, what happened to the people left behind in China.

The 100 secret senses