Dahlia is a Samoan New Zealander who is an award winning author, indie publisher and creator of Mila’s Books – Pasifika children’s books that help our tamaiti to be seen, heard and valued as Pasifika.
Since 2019, Dahlia has written children’s stories and is the first Pasifika author to have authored stories that have been published across all schooling levels (pre-school, primary school and high school) while also creating the Mila’s My Aganu‘u Series – the first Pasifika children’s picture books in the world created by an all-Pasifika team. In 2021 she authored Te Papa Tongarewa’s first Samoan bilingual board book, Asiasiga i le falemataaga i Te Papa / Going to Te Papa, which won a Storylines Notable Book Award.
Ultimately, Dahlia is a passionate educator would love to enable tamaiti to confidently and proudly succeed as Pasifika and is driven by sharing the power of our beautiful Pasifika stories with the world. This is why she would love to see endless options of accessible and rich quality Pasifika stories and resources that reflect our Pasifika values, languages, cultures and most importantly, our tamaiti.

Dahlia also facilitates cultural responsive practice workshops in schools and completes literacy and book projects for a variety of schools, organisations and book publishers. Along Dahlia’s Mila’s Books journey she has achieved the following milestones so far: