Graphic Novel
Graphic Novel
Same Difference and Other Stories
Adult graphic novel. Through a series of sensitive -- and often hilarious -- short stories, Kim deftly explores the not-so-average twenty-something's quarter-life crisis, romantic neurosis, and a refreshing slice of Korean-American life.
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Graphic Novel
American Born Chinese
YA graphic novel. Alternates three interrelated stories about the problems of young Chinese Americans trying to participate in the popular culture. Presented in comic book format. Age: 13+
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Graphic Novel
Boxers
YA graphic novel. In China in 1898 bands of foreign missionaries and soldiers roam the countryside, bullying and robbing Chinese peasants. Little Bao has had enough: harnessing the powers of ancient Chinese gods, he recruits an army of Boxers--commoners trained in kung fu who fight to free China from "foreign devils." Age: 13+
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Graphic Novel
Saints
YA graphic novel. "China, 1898. An unwanted fourth daughter, Four-Girl isn't even given a proper name by her family. She finds friendship and a name, Vibiana in the most unlikely of places: Christianity. But China is a dangerous place for Christians. The Boxer Rebellion is murdering Westerners and Chinese Christians alike. Torn between her nation and her Christian friends, Vibiana will have to decide where her true loyalties lie ... and whether she is willing to die for her faith."--Amazon.com. Age: 13+
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Graphic Novel
The Shadow Hero
YA graphic novel. In the comics boom of the 1940s, a legend was born: the Green Turtle. He solved crimes and fought injustice just like the other comics characters. But this mysterious masked crusader was hiding something more than your run-of-the-mill secret identity: the Green Turtle was the first Asian American super hero. The comic had a short run before lapsing into obscurity, but Gene Luen Yang has revived this character in Shadow Hero, a new graphic novel that creates an origin story for the Green Turtle. Age: 13+
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Large Print
Large Print
Everything I Never Told You
Adult fiction. "Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet." So begins the story of this novel about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee; their middle daughter, a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. Her parents are determined that Lydia will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue-in Marilyn's case that her daughter become a doctor rather than a homemaker, in James's case that Lydia be popular at school, a girl with a busy social life and the center of every party. When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, the delicate balancing act that has been keeping the Lee family together tumbles into chaos, forcing them to confront the long-kept secrets that have been slowly pulling them apart.
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Large Print
Little Fires Everywhere
Adult fiction. In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned - from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren - an enigmatic artist and single mother - who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town--and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.
Where to Find:
Large Print
The Sympathizer
Adult fiction. The story of a South Vietnamese captain--a man brought up by an absent French father and a poor Vietnamese mother, a man who went to university in America--who returns to Vietnam to fight for the Communist cause.
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Large Print
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
Adult fiction. A young man named Little Dog writes a letter to his mother, who cannot read, investigating a family history begun in Vietnam and addressing stark issues of race, class, and masculinity.
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Spanish Language
Spanish Language
They Called Us Enemy
Adult nonfiction graphic novel. A stunning graphic memoir recounting actor/author/activist George Takei's childhood imprisoned within American concentration camps during World War II. Experience the forces that shaped an American icon -- and America itself -- in this gripping tale of courage, country, loyalty, and love. Age: 11+
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Fiction
Fiction
Down and Across
YA fiction. Sixteen-year-old Scott Ferdowsi's impromptu trip to a famous professor for advice about success turns into a summer of freedom that brings him answers in unexpected places. "Quirky and charming, wise and unpredictable."--Khaled Hosseini, #1 "New York Times"-bestselling author of "The Kite Runner."
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Fiction
To All the Boys I've Loved Before
YA fiction. Lara Jean keeps her love letters in a hatbox her mother gave her. One for every boy she's ever loved. The letters are for her eyes only. Until the day they are mailed, and suddenly Lara Jean's love life goes from imaginary to out of control. This is the first book in the series. Age: 14+
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Fiction
The Leavers
Adult fiction. "One morning, Deming Guo's mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home. With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate. Set in New York and China, the Leavers is the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he's loved has been taken away--and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past."-- Provided by publisher.
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Fiction
Dust of Life: A True Ban Vinai Love Story
Adult fiction. "It was 1977 and Ban Vinai had just been set up as a refugee camp for thousands of Hmong who fled the new communist regime in Laos to the safety of Thailand. Mua, a young Hmong man, had just recently completed his university studies and was living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He was asked by Pafua, a refugee girl in Ban Vinai, to help sponsor her and her family for settlement in the United States. Although he hardly knew her, he travelled to Thailand to see what he could do. It was agreed that if they got on well, he would marry her and apply for her and her family to come and live with him in America. In the meantime, he went to work on a Thai government project with Hmong opium growers in Chiangmai where he met a young Thai woman named Phorn..." -from HmongABC.com
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Fiction
Free Food for Millionaires
Adult fiction. Casey Han is a strong-willed, Queens-bred daughter of Korean immigrants who is addicted to a glamorous Manhattan lifestyle she cannot afford. Fresh out of Princeton with an economics degree, no job, and a popular white boyfriend, Casey is determined to carve a space for herself in the glittering world she craves--but at what cost?
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Fiction
Pachinko
Adult fiction. "PACHINKO follows one Korean family through the generations, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor yet proud family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them all. Deserted by her lover, Sunja is saved when a young tubercular minister offers to marry and bring her to Japan. So begins a sweeping saga of an exceptional family in exile from its homeland and caught in the indifferent arc of history. Through desperate struggles and hard-won triumphs, its members are bound together by deep roots as they face enduring questions of faith, family, and identity"-- Provided by publisher.
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Fiction
The Downstairs Girl
YA fiction. "1890, Atlanta. By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel Caroline Payne, the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for 'the genteel Southern lady'"-- Provided by publisher. Age: 13+
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Fiction
Husi : a Clouded Future is Still Translucent
Adult fiction. As a child, Husi witnesses the horrible death of her beloved family. Her world is shattered and gone, leaving her with nothing but her name. Destiny, however guides her to be adopted into a new family, and with their love and help, Husi manages to rise above all the circumstances. Transformed from a scared and traumatized little girl to a beautiful and strong young woman, Husi learns how to forgive and to love.
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Fiction
Severance
Adult fiction. "A survivor of an apocalyptic plague maintains a blog about a decimated Manhattan before joining a motley group of survivors to search for a place to rebuild, a goal that is complicated by an unscrupulous group leader." -- NoveList
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Fiction
A Step from Heaven
YA fiction. When Young Ju's family leave Korea to live in America they think all their dreams will come true, but customs and language are so different that Young Ju must defy tradition in order to make a new life. Age: 13+
Where to Find:
Fiction
Everything I Never Told You
Adult fiction. "Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet." So begins the story of this novel about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee; their middle daughter, a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. Her parents are determined that Lydia will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue-in Marilyn's case that her daughter become a doctor rather than a homemaker, in James's case that Lydia be popular at school, a girl with a busy social life and the center of every party. When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, the delicate balancing act that has been keeping the Lee family together tumbles into chaos, forcing them to confront the long-kept secrets that have been slowly pulling them apart.
Where to Find:
Fiction
Little Fires Everywhere
Adult fiction. In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned - from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren - an enigmatic artist and single mother - who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town--and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.
Where to Find:
Fiction
The Refugees
Adult fiction. This is a collection of stories exploring questions of immigration, identity, love, and family. From a young Vietnamese refugee who suffers profound culture shock when he comes to live with two gay men in San Francisco, to a woman whose husband is suffering from dementia and starts to confuse her with a former lover, to a girl living in Ho Chi Minh City whose older half sister comes back from America having seemingly accomplished everything she never will, these stories are a captivating testament to the dreams and hardships of immigration".
Where to Find:
Fiction
The Sympathizer
Adult fiction. The story of a South Vietnamese captain--a man brought up by an absent French father and a poor Vietnamese mother, a man who went to university in America--who returns to Vietnam to fight for the Communist cause.
Where to Find:
Fiction
The Joy Luck Club
Adult fiction. "In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan's debut novel--now widely regarded as a modern classic--examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between these four women and their American-born daughters."--Publisher's description.
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Fiction
The Kitchen God's Wife
Adult fiction. For forty years, in China and in San Francisco, Winnie Louie and Helen Kwong have kept certain confidences. Suddenly, those shattering secrets are about to be revealed. So begins a series of comic misunderstandings and heartbreaking realizations about luck, loss, and trust; about the things a mother cannot tell her daughter, the secrets daughters keep, and the miraculous resiliency of love.
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Fiction
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
Adult fiction. A young man named Little Dog writes a letter to his mother, who cannot read, investigating a family history begun in Vietnam and addressing stark issues of race, class, and masculinity.
Where to Find:
Fiction
Interior Chinatown
Adult fiction. From the infinitely inventive author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe comes a deeply personal novel about race, pop culture, assimilation, and escaping the roles we are forced to play.
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Nonfiction
Nonfiction
All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir
Adult nonfiction. Nicole Chung investigates the mysteries and complexities of her transracial adoption. Told with startling insight, All You Can Ever Know is a profound and moving chronicle of unexpected family for anyone who has struggled to figure out where they belong.
Where to Find:
Nonfiction
How Do I Begin? : A Hmong American Literary Anthology
Adult nonfiction. How Do I Begin? is the struggle to preserve on paper the Hmong American experience. In this anthology, readers will find elaborate soul-calling ceremonies, a woman questioning the seeming tyranny of her parents and future in-laws, the temptation of gangs and drugs, and the shame and embarrassment of being different in a culture that obsessively values homogeneity. Some pieces revisit the ghosts of war. Others lament the loss of a country. Many offer glimpses into intergenerational tensions exacerbated by the differences in Hmong and American culture.
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Nonfiction
Minor Feelings : An Asian American Reckoning
Adult nonfiction. "Asian Americans inhabit a purgatorial status: neither white enough nor black enough, unmentioned in most conversations about racial identity. In the popular imagination, Asian Americans are all high-achieving professionals. But in reality, this is the most economically divided group in the country, a tenuous alliance of people with roots from South Asia to East Asia to the Pacific Islands, from tech millionaires to service industry laborers. How do we speak honestly about the Asian American condition--if such a thing exists? Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong fearlessly and provocatively confronts this thorny subject, blending memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose the truth of racialized consciousness in America." -- Provided by publisher.
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Nonfiction
They Called Us Enemy
Adult nonfiction graphic novel. A stunning graphic memoir recounting actor/author/activist George Takei's childhood imprisoned within American concentration camps during World War II. Experience the forces that shaped an American icon -- and America itself -- in this gripping tale of courage, country, loyalty, and love. Age: 11+
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
Audiobooks
All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir
Adult nonfiction. Nicole Chung investigates the mysteries and complexities of her transracial adoption. Told with startling insight, All You Can Ever Know is a profound and moving chronicle of unexpected family for anyone who has struggled to figure out where they belong.
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
To All the Boys I've Loved Before
YA fiction. Lara Jean keeps her love letters in a hatbox her mother gave her. One for every boy she's ever loved. The letters are for her eyes only. Until the day they are mailed, and suddenly Lara Jean's love life goes from imaginary to out of control. This is the first book in the series. Age: 14+
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
The Leavers
Adult fiction. "One morning, Deming Guo's mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home. With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate. Set in New York and China, the Leavers is the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he's loved has been taken away--and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past."-- Provided by publisher.
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
Pachinko
Adult fiction. "PACHINKO follows one Korean family through the generations, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor yet proud family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them all. Deserted by her lover, Sunja is saved when a young tubercular minister offers to marry and bring her to Japan. So begins a sweeping saga of an exceptional family in exile from its homeland and caught in the indifferent arc of history. Through desperate struggles and hard-won triumphs, its members are bound together by deep roots as they face enduring questions of faith, family, and identity"-- Provided by publisher.
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
The Downstairs Girl
YA fiction. "1890, Atlanta. By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel Caroline Payne, the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for 'the genteel Southern lady'"-- Provided by publisher. Age: 13+
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
A Step from Heaven
YA fiction. When Young Ju's family leave Korea to live in America they think all their dreams will come true, but customs and language are so different that Young Ju must defy tradition in order to make a new life. Age: 13+
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
Everything I Never Told You
Adult fiction. "Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet." So begins the story of this novel about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee; their middle daughter, a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. Her parents are determined that Lydia will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue-in Marilyn's case that her daughter become a doctor rather than a homemaker, in James's case that Lydia be popular at school, a girl with a busy social life and the center of every party. When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, the delicate balancing act that has been keeping the Lee family together tumbles into chaos, forcing them to confront the long-kept secrets that have been slowly pulling them apart.
Where to Find:
Audiobooks
Little Fires Everywhere
Adult fiction. In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned - from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren - an enigmatic artist and single mother - who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town--and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.
Where to Find: