Yulia Handy was born in the former Soviet Union port city of Novorossiysk along the northern shores of the Black Sea. She earned a bachelor of economics from Modern University. In 2005 she traveled for what was planned to be a six-month visit to Santa Barbara, California. After meeting her soon to be husband, however, she altered her plans and permanently settled in the United States. Yulia's nostalgia for her home town and the family and friends she left behind eventually took form in the fictional land of Scythia, named after an actual historic region that encompassed the eastern Black Sea coast where she grew up. The original script was written in Yulia's native Russian language in 2008. Later she decided to translate the manuscript into English. Yulia currently lives with her husband and son in Grand Forks, North Dakota.