Visual Arts
“(re)Frame:Haub Family Collection of Western American Art” is a project that expands the narratives about the art of the American West with the opening of four new exhibitions that look at the region from a range of perspectives. The shows include “Finding Home:The Chinese American West” curated by Lele Barnett on view through September 5, 2027.”Blackness is…the refusal to be Reduced” by Nikesha Breeze on view through March 14, 2027. “Nepantla: The Land is the Beloved” by Maymanah Farhat on view through September 6, 2026 and “The Abiquenos and The Artist” curated by Patricia Marroquin Norby on view through May 31, 2026. Also on view is “Painting Deconstructed: Selections from the Northwest Collection” on view through January 5, 2025. 253-272-4258 or go to https://www.tacomaartmuseum.org or [emailprotected]. Tacoma Art Museum is at 1701 Pacific Avenue.
In honor of Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the city of Bellevue and MG2 present an art exhibit showcasing artists with AANHPI roots and connections to the Pacific Northwest. Curated by Mami Shimomura, the exhibit will be on display from May 6 – 31, 2024 on the City Hall concourse and open during business hours on weekdays from 8am – 4pm. Includes work by Luly Yang, Aaliyah Gupta, Michelle Kumata, Juliet Shen, Alan Lau (full disclosure-that’s me), Eliachi Kimaro, Carina A. del Rosario, Naoko Morisawa, Mami Shimomura, Chin Woo, Kenneth Pai, Ritsuko Kashiba, Larine Chung, Mayumi Oda, Sawada Tetsoro, Hiro Yamagata, Hiroshi Yamano, Paul Horiuchi, Gihei f*ckushi, Frank Fujii and Tie-Feng Jiang. 450 – 110th Ave. NE in Bellevue, WA. For more details, try bellevuewa.gov or call 425-452-6800.
“Yukata Inspired” is an invitational group exhibition that includes metal-smith and collage artists who combine metal, fabric, paper and other non-traditional materials that evoke traditional Japanese art forms. At Danaca Design Gallery in Fremont. May 10 – June 23, 2024. Try [emailprotected] or 206-524-0916 for details and information.
“Site/Non-site” is a group show in which artists Aaliyah Gupta, JoEllen Wang, Tara Tamaribuchi and Karey Kessler grapple with questions of place. May 2 – June 1, 2024. Shift Gallery at 312 S. Washington St. in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. Go to www.shiftgallery.org for details.
Paul Horiuchi has work on view at Christian Grevstad Gallery Space at 312 Occidental Ave. S. in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. Ongoing. Mon. – Fri. by appointment only.206-938-4360 or www.grevstad.com.
Davidson Galleries features in their online gallery work by artists Keisei Kobayashi and Seiko Tachibana. 313 Occidental Ave. S. in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. 206-624-7684 or www.davidsongalleries.com.
Henry Art Gallery situated on the Seattle campus of the University of Washington has the following –Upcoming shows include the following – Lucy Kim shows her work July 2024 – February 2025. Kim is a Korean American interdisciplinary artist who works across painting, sculpture and biological media. For her Henry exhibition, she is creating an installation of new melanin works made from images of genetically modified plants, extending her broader investigation into the entangled relationship between bioengineering, visual appearance and the social and cultural construction of race and perception. Christine Sun Kim has a show from July 2024 – March 2025. Across drawing, video and performance, Kim disrupts relationships with the sonic environment to question social norms that shape whose voices matter. For the Henry, she creates an exterior mural that visualizes the musicality of ASL and expounds upon her embodied experiences as a deaf person in a hearing dominant society.15th Ave NE and NE 41st St.206-543-2280 or go to henryart.org.
The Frye Art Museum’s upcoming exhibitions include the following – “After/Images” by Stephanie Syjuco on view from June 1 – September 8, 2024. Syjuco rephotographs and reconstructs archival photographs digitally, manipulating them to reveal the instability of images and the violence of the colonial gaze. This show centers on the camera as a technology of imperialism that records and creates racialized American histories. “Twilight Child” on view from June 15 – September 15, 2024, brings together the work of Antonia Kuo and Martin Wong, two queer diasporic Chinese artists born more than forty years apart. Both of artist’s works combine the influences of their Chinese heritage. The Frye Art Museum is at 704 Terry in Seattle. 206-432-8214 or fryemuseum.org.
Seattle Art Museum’s downtown location has the following – ”Deities & Demons: Supernatural in Japanese Art” is ongoing. “Chronicles of a Global East” is ongoing. Seattle Asian Art Museum has the following –“Anida Yoeu Ali: Hybrid Skin, Mystical Presence” is on view through July 7, 2024. Ali is an internationally renowned artist with home bases in both Tacoma and Phnom Penh. The exhibition explores two of her performance-based works and marks the artist’s SAM debut and the first solo show of a Cambodian American artist in the museum’s 90-year history. On Saturday June 1, a live performance of “The Red Chador” will be performed all day long within the museum and areas outside as well. “Boundless: Stories of Asian Art” is an ongoing group show re-imagining of items from the museum’s permanent collection of Asian art. In the Fuller Garden Court of the museum, you will find Kenzan Tsutakawa Chinn’s permanent installation “Gather.” Tsutakawa Chinn is a Seattle-raised, New York-based LED light installation artist. The Saturday University lecture series continues at SAAM with these talks. Sonal Khullar, Associate Professor of South Asian Studies at the University of Pennsylvania addresses the topic of “Pigeons and Stray Hens in Contemporary south Asian Art” on June 8, 2024. Museum tickets released every Thursday at 10am. For museum admission, purchase tickets online in advance and save $3. Ticket prices increase if you wait until the day of your visit to purchase so plan ahead and get the best price. Tickets are released online on a monthly rolling basis. Seattle Art Museum is downtown at 1300 First Ave. Seattle Asian Art Museum is at 1400 E. Prospect St. in Volunteer Park.206-654-3100 or seattleartmuseum.org.
The Wing Luke Asian Museum. Hours are Wednesdays through Sundays from 10am – 5pm. “Hello Auntie, Hello Uncle: Conversations with Our Elders” is a show that explores the many roles Elders play in our communities and celebrates their lives and our achievements and honors the wisdom gained with time. On view April 5 – February 23, 2025.On view through September 14, 2024 in the Special Exhibition Gallery is “Sound Check! The Music We Make”. This exhibit explores the role music has played in Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander lives and communities. This interactive exhibit includes behind the scenes – photos, framed artworks, podcasts, artifacts, storylines, audio, and video that feature Asian artists’ expressions of cultural identity. For more information on these programs, try [emailprotected]. “New Years All Year Around” on view through July 16, 2024. Ongoing are the following – “Honoring Our Journey” is a permanent exhibit dedicated to the Asian Pacific American experience, “I Am Filipino” looks at the story of Filipino Americans”, “Hometown Desi” covers the local South Asian experience and “Cambodian Cultural Museum and Killing Fields Memorial” looks at the Cambodian Americaexperience and the impact of the Killing fields on that country’s history. There are virtual tours of the museum on weekday mornings. Pre-booking available for private groups. Contact the museum to sign up. Check out what’s in the gift shop with the Museum’s online marketplace. The monthly storytime programs can be watched at www.digitalwingluke.org/programs.
719 South King St. Go to https://www.wingluke.org for details. Go to wingluke.org for details.
KOBO, a unique shop of arts and crafts from Japan and items made by Northwest artists has two shops in Seattle on Capitol Hill and in the Chinatown/ID/Japantown community downtown. The store has a new instagram shopping account @koboseattleshop. Now showing new ceramic bosatsu figures from Seattle artist Tomoko Suzuki and figures of boars by Lisa Asagi from Hawai’i. The Capitol Hill store is at 814 E. Roy St. and their hours are Mon. – Sat. from 11am to 5pm.Their # is 206-726-0704 to order or to inquire about the ingredients, contents and price. KOBO at Higo is at 604 South Jackson St. in the CID.
“flourish like an ocean’s grief” is an interdisciplinary installation by Moonyeka and House of Kilig on view May 31 – July 26, 2024. The work weaves deconstructed elements of the group’s audio-visual performance research for “Harana for The Aswang” which is a Filipix-Southern Americas serenade song rooted in courtship and grief rituals. This piece re-myths the Siren archetype through a prism of a queer and trans-perspective. Opening reception on Friday, May 31, 2024 at 7pm. Artist talk on Friday, July 26, 2024 at 7pm both in-person and streaming on YouTube and Facebook Live. There will be a Youth Workshop to be announced. For details and to sign up, go to [emailprotected]. Jack Straw Cultural Center New Media Gallery at 4261 Roosevelt Way NE in Seattle’s University District. For more information, go to @mOOnyeka @houseofkilig.
The Pacific Bonsai Museum has the following – “Small Talk: All the Dirt On Growing Mini-But-Mighty Trees”, a special exhibit that runs from May 11, 2024 – November 5. 2025. The exhibit brings the material to life with 41 living trees using anime-inspired illustrations, emojis and text-like illustrations. Graphic painted murals by Judy Chia Hui Hsu. Free but a $12 suggested donation for those who can afford it. Also on-going is the exhibit, “Works of Living Art from Our Permanent Bonsai Collection”. 2515 South 336thSt. in Federal Way, WA. Admission is by donation. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10am – 4pm. 253-353-7345 or email[emailprotected].
Bainbridge Island Museum of Art has “Kumi Korf: A World of Her Own” in which this intaglio printmaker, book artist, painter and architect fashions her own art inspired by the hardships of WWII, the loss of a sister figure and the festivals of Japanese culture. Also the work of Paul Horiuchi and Roger Shimomura is included in a group show entitled “Permanent Collection: So Far”. All shows up until June 2, 2024. 550
Winslow Way East on Bainbridge Island. 206-842-4451 or biartmeusem.org.
Local sculptor June Sekiguchi has been busy on many fronts, particularly in the field of public art. As part of a Seattle art group named CLUSTER, she participated in an art exchange showing work in Supermarket, an alternative art fair in Stockholm April 25 – 28, 2024. An earlier large sculptural piece entitled “Manifestations” was shown at ARTS at King Street Station at 303 S. Jackson St. Her work was included in a group show entitled “Rites of Spring” at Chatwin Arts in May at 323 1st Ave. S. The Seattle Convention Center purchased her piece “Jack III” for their collection recently. An outdoor sculptural piece was installed as part of the Tapestry Project along with other local artists at 12th & Yesler in Seattle’s Central District. Themes in the work presented celebrate the diverse cultures that historically inhabited the Central District. This summer, her piece entitled “Piper’s Willow Gate” will be installed at Quarterra in Redmond. It will stand at the south entrance on the Marymoor Park side of the complex. The Piper Willow tree is native to Marymoor Park. The artist has received a commission to design an outdoor water feature at the entrance of Cambria Hotel in Portland near the Portland Art Museum. The piece’s design is inspired by the Northwest sword fern. She has also received a commission from the city of Issaquah to create wayfinding sculptures. In the planning stages are the design of 5 panels on the vertical front of laptop tables in the reconstruction of Concourse C at Sea Tac Airport. Set for 2026. She will have a temporary public art piece commissioned by the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture in Seattle Center set for August 2024-February 2025.
“SHINKA – Evolution Revolution” is an immersive Japanese automotive exhibit that opened March 16, 2024 at the Lemay-America’s Car Museum.2702 East “D” St. in Tacoma. Try americascarmuseum.org for details.
The Lynnwood Event Center has a group show entitled “Uncommon Threads: A Fiber Arts Experience” on view through June 14, 2024. It includes the work of multi-media artist Bella Yongok Kim. 3711-196th St. SW in Lynnwood,WA. 425-778-7155 or lynnwoodeventcenter.com/art.
The Outdoor Sculpture Collection on the campus of Western Washington University in Bellingham is open and accessible to everyone. This is an outdoor collection of major sculptures from the late 20thcentury to the present and includes work by Do Ho Suh, Sarah Sze and Isamu Noguchi among others. Get a map from the information booth and explore the campus collection for yourself. Call 360-650-3900.
“The Flex” is a show of paintings by Hyojin Um that expresses the profound connection between art and healing. May 30 – June 30, 2024. Smith & Vallee Gallery at 5742 Gilkey Ave. in Edison, WA.360-766-6230 or [emailprotected].
“Tsutakawa:Generations” is a group show that looks at the work of George Tsutakawa, Gerard Tsutakawa and Kenzan Tsutakawa-Chinn on view from June 13 – September 16, 2024.San Juan Islands Museum of Art. 540 Spring St. in Friday Harbor,WA. 360-370-5050 or try [emailprotected] or www.sjima.org.
The Northwest Museum of Arts And Culture in Spokane has the following – The exhibit entitled “Frank S. Matsura: Portraits From the Borderland” has been extended through June 9, 2024. Against a backdrop of regional transformation, this frontier photographer explored indigenous representation through a multi-dimensional lens. 2316 West First Ave. in Spokane, WA.509-456-3931 or try northwestmuseum.org.
The Chinese Canadian Museum will officially open in its permanent location at the Wang Sang Building at 51 East Pender St. in Vancouver BC’s Chinatown on July 1, 2023. This comes at a time when that community is struggling under a rising tide of racism and gentrification. The inaugural exhibition is called “The Paper Trail” crated by Catherine Clement and its opening day is also the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Immigration Act. The act required every Chinese person in Canada to register and banned entry to all but students, merchants, diplomats and Canadian-born Chinese returning from education in China. It remained in full effect until 1947. For details, go to chinesecanadianmuseum.ca.
The Nikkei National Museum & Cultural Centre has the following – Ongoing is “WOVEN:Setsuko Piroche’s Wonderland” which looks at the career of this diverse cross-cultural artist with textile works, ceramics, Nihonga paintings and illustrations for Children’s books. “Women of Change: Celebrating Japanese Canadian Leaders” remains on view through September 24, 2024. Also on view is an ongoing exhibit on “TAIKEN: Japanese Canadians Since 1877”. Nikkei National Museum & Cultural Centre in Burnaby at 6688 Southoaks Crescent.604-777-7000 or try nikkeiplace.org.
The Kamloops Art Gallery in Kamloops presents “Cindy Michizuki: Ancestral Dreams & Other Premonitions” which addresses immigrant stories as a way to explore relationships to the transpacific, invisible histories, archives and memory. Opening April 20, 2024. 101-465 Victoria St. 250-377-2400 or try kag.bc.ca.
In Nanaimo, the Nanaimo Art Gallery presents a group show “Sun Over Swamp” on which ceramic artists use canvas, wood, linen and ceramic to reflect on our fragile yet globally interconnected biomes. Includes work by Rebecca Brewer, Azadeh Elmizadeh, Rita Letendre, Gailan Ngan and Takao Tanabe. Opening April 27, 2024. 150 Commerical St. 250-754-1750 or nanaimoartgallery.ca.
The Richmond Art Gallery in Richmond has the following opening on April 20, 2024. “Unit Bruises:Theodore Wan & Paul Wong, 1975-1979” brings together the works of two Chinese-Canadian conceptual artists. Curated by Michael Dang.180-7700 Minoru Gate. 604-247-8300 or richmondartgallery.org.
The Kelowna Art Gallery has organized a retrospective for “Takao Tanabe: Printmaker” and includes over 60 prints spanning his career showcasing landscapes that bridge the gap between abstraction and realism. Through June 2, 2024. Showing at the Surrey Art Gallery in Surrey. 13750-88th Ave.604-501-5566 or try surrey.ca/artgallery.
The Chinese Canadian Museum honors the history, East Pender St. located in an historic building in Vancouver’s Chinatown. 51 East Pender St. 604-262-0990 or chinesecanadianmuseum.ca.
The Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver has an ongoing screening of Diane Severin Nguyen’s feature-length film, “if I hadn’t created my own world, I would have died in someone else’s”. 555 Nelson St. 604-681-2700 or cagvancouver.org.
The Jordan Schnitzer Museum on the University of Oregon campus in Eugene has the following – Other shows include “Half the Sky: Women in Chinese Art” and “Woman Was the Sun: Art of Japanese Women.”1430 Johnson Lane in Eugene, Oregon. 541-346-3027.
Portland Japanese Garden has the following exhibit – “Vision of Place” is the title of an exhibition about the island of Hokkaido.”Shashin: Photographic Frontiers of Hokkaido” AND “Quiet Reflections of Hokkaido Winter: Photography by Sandra Chandler”.On view in the Pavilion Gallery and Tanabe Gallery through June 10, 2024.611 SW Kingston Ave. 503-223-1321 or japanesegarden.org.
Japanese American Museum of Oregon is now open in a new space. Current exhibits include the following –“Minidoka Trunk”, a traveling digital exhibit that explores a teenager’s memories of the WWII War Relocation Authority’s Minidoka Concentration Camp using artifacts from the museum’s permanent collection to tell the story. “Because of Bill: William Sumio Naito’s Legacy in Portland” explores the life and career of this city’s mover and shaker and how he shaped modern Portland. Both on view through September 1, 2024.Permanent exhibit is “Oregon’s Nikkei”. Questions? Email [emailprotected]. The museum is at 411 Flanders St. in Portland, Oregon.
One of the oldest galleries in Portland is the member-driven Blackfish Gallery. Kanetaka Ikeda continues an ongoing series of works inspired by a universe seen in the artist’s dream with his paintings and sculpture. In the main gallery and entitled “Sun, Stars, and Cosmic Tree”. May 1 – June 1, 2024.The gallery’s new location is 938 NW Everett St. 503-224-2634 or try www.blackfish.com.
The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art. 1430 Johnson Lane on the University of Oregon campus. “Half the Sky: Women in Chinese Art” through July 7, 2024. “Woman Was the Sun-Art of Japanese Women” through August 4, 2024. Eugene, Oregon. 541-346-3027 or try jsma.uoregon.edu.
Portland Chinatown Museum has the following – “Bong Wai Chen: Reframing Tradition” on view through October 27. 2024. Chen was a noted Chinese brushpainter and calligrapher who settled in Portland and had a large influence in the city for years. Portland installation artist Roberta Wong has a window installation in memory of Vincent Chin, the Chinese American man killed by two Detroit workers entitled “Vincent”. Portland Chinatown Museum is located at 127 N.W. Third Ave. 503-224-0008 or try portlandchinatown.org or email [emailprotected].
On view now through May, 2024 at the Froelick Gallery are solo exhibitions by Seiichi Hiroshima of Tokyo and V. Maldonado of Portland. Also a special group show of our Japanese artists celebrating Asian Heritage Month includes work by Yoshiro Kitai, Ritsuko Ozeki and Takahiko Hayashi. “Breath of line Breath of life” showcases new paintings by Takahiko Hayashi June 4 – July 13, 2024. Yoshiro Kitai has a one person show December 3, 2024 – February 1, 2025. 714 NW Davis St. 503-222-1142 or try froelickgallery.com.
The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and De Young Museum present “Lee Mingwei: Rituals of Care.” Inspired by personal experiences and world events, Lee Ming Wei creates interactive installations and performances. Includes seven projects made between 1995 – 2024 that place visitors at the center of radical acts of generosity and care. “Chque Souffleune Dance” is a new work commissioned by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and will be on view at Minnesota St. Project. It will be on view on film at the de Young Museum April 9 – July 7, 2024. The exhibit itself remains on view through July 17, 2024 at the De Young Museum located in Golden Gate Park at 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive in San Francisco. For details, go to famsf.org.
The Asian Art Museum, San Francisco has the following currently on view. “Phoenix Kingdoms: The Last Splendor of China’s Bronze Age” through July 22, 2024. “Takashi Murakami” on view through July 22, 2024.“Into View: New Voices, New Stories” introduces newly acquired work by fourteen contemporary artists whose alternative narratives of mythology, history and identity speak to a radically re-imagined future. On view through August 3, 2024. “RAD (Research & Development)” is an experimental space at the intersection of art and technology and remains on view through October 31, 2024.“Deities, Paragons, and Legends: Storytelling in Chinese Pictorial Arts” showcases depictions of strange tales that have informed and entertained Chinese audiences for centuries” and remains on view through July 8, 2024. Japanese Ink Paintings” on view through June 10. 2024.Ongoing are these shows – “Jakhodo Today” which showcase Korean modern art. “Ruth Asawa:Untitled.” “East West Bank Terrace.” “Taihu Rock- East Wind II.” And upcoming is “East Kingdoms: The Last Splendor of China’s Bronze Age” opening April 19, 2024. “Afruz Amighi: My House, My Tomb” is an installation that uses light and shadow to evoke forgotten histories of the Taj Mahal. Outside murals by Channel Miller and Jennifer K. Wofford are visible from Hyde St. 200 Larkin St. San Francisco, CA. 415-581-3500.
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) presents the following – California artist “Chiura Obata” is an exhibit with forty of his watercolors, prints and ink paintings on view through July 14, 2024. The first solo exhibition in Northern California of Yayoi Kusama includes several of her installations in “Yayoi Kusama: Infinite Love” on view through Sept. 7, 2024. One of her monumental sculptures entitled “Aspiring to Pumpkin’s Love, The Love In My Heart” is on view through 2025. “of whales” is an immersive video and sound installation by Wu Tsang that is ongoing. 151 Third St. 415-357-40000 or sfmoma.org.
Cantor Arts Center on the Stanford University campus has the following – “T.T. Takemoto: Remembering in the Absence of Memory” on view from June 19 – December 1, 2024 features two video works and two complimentary series of small handmade objects and works on paper by this Bay Area artist. The video centers on queer experiences of intimacy in pre-war and WWII contexts. An installation of handcrafted kokeshi dolls offers engagement with overlooked narratives in Asian American history. “Spirit House” is a group show on view September 4, 2024 – January 19, 2025. Throughout SE Asia, the consideration of life and death occurs in the spiritual realm that comes in the form of spirit houses. This exhibit surveys how thirty three contemporary artists of Asian descent are exploring modes of making spirit houses. Includes work by Pao Houa Her, Tuan Andrew Nguyen, Maia Cruz Palileo, Catalina Ouyang and filmmaker/visual artist Apichatpong Weerasethakul. “The Faces of Ruth Asawa” exhibits the 233 ceramic life masks that originally hung on the exterior of her Noe Valley home. Ongoing. 328 Lomita Drive at Museum Way on the Stanford University Campus, Stanford, CA. 650-723-4177 or go to https://museum.stanford.edu/eop.
The Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History presents these shows on regional history. “Sowing Seeds: Filipino American Stories from the Pajaro Valley” is a community-driven exhibition that preserves and uplifts stories of Filipino migration and labor in Watsonville and the greater Pajaro Valley of Central California. On view through August 4, 2024.Artists in this show are Minerva Amistoso, Binh Danh, Ant Lorenzo, Sandra Lucille, Johanna Poethig, Ruth Tabancay, Jennifer Wofford and Connie Zheng. It also includes archival materials from 17 family collections from the “Watsonville is in the Heart Digital Archive”.705 Front St. in Santa Cruz, CA. try santacruzmah.org or [emailprotected].
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) has the following – “Korean Treasures from the Chester and Cameron Chang Collection” is the largest Korean art collection ever given to LACMA. It includes traditional Korean paintings, calligraphic folding screens, 20th century oil paintings and ceramics of the Goryo and Joeson dynasties.Remains on view through June 30, 2024. “Dining with the Sultan: The Fine Art of Feasting” on view through August 4, 2024. LACMA is at 5905 Wilshire Blvd. in Los Angeles, CA. 323-857-6000 or go to www.lacma.org.
The Fowler Museum at UCLA explores global arts and cultures with an emphasis on Africa, Asia, the Pacific and indigenous Americas – past and present. “Creating in Community: Fowler at 60” is on view through June 2, 2024.Ongoing is “Cosmic Provenance: A 60th Anniversary Installation” & “Intersections: World Arts, Local Lives”. On permanent display is “Reflecting Culture: The Francis E. Fowler Jr. Collection of Silver”. 308 Charles E. Young Drive N. in Los Angeles, CA. 310-206-5663 or try fowler.ucla.edu.
Japan House Los Angeles has the following – “Yes KAWAII is Art – Express Yourself” with Sebastian Matsuda. May 2 – November 3, 2024. In the Hollywood & Highland Building on Level 2 & 5 on 6806 Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles.1-800-516-0565 ortry japanhousela.com.
The Japanese American National Museum (JANM) has the following –Check janm.org/events for details on the public events. “Giant Robot Biennale 5” is on view through September 1, 2024. For this show, JANM partners with Eric Nakamura, editor of Giant Robot to produce this recurring art exhibition that highlights diverse creative works that celebrate the ethos of Giant Robot, an Asian American alternative pop culture encompassing pop art, skateboard, comic book, graphic arts and vinyl toy culture. This edition features the work of Sean Chao, Felicia Chiao, Lke Church, Giorgiko, James Jean, Taylor Lee, Mike Shinoda, Rain Szeto, Yoskay Yamamoto and many others. On view through September 1, 2024 will be “J.T. Sata: Immigrant Modernist”. Sata was an amateur photographer in the 1920/30s who photographed in and around Little Tokyo, at sea, in the mountains and also created modernist portraits and abstractions. During his WWII internment he also made drawings and paintings. Both his pre-war photography and his internment camp artwork are included. Curated by Dennis Reed. “Ireicho” is a sacred book that records the names of over 125,000 persons of Japanese ancestry who were imprisoned during WWII. Ongoing. Also ongoing at JANM is “Common Ground – The Heart of Community” which features a WWII Japanese internment camp building. Ongoing is “The Interactive Story File of Lawson Ichiro Sakai”, an oral history project in which visitors can ask Japanese American elder Sakai any questions they want about his life and past history such as the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese internment camps, his service as a soldier in WWII. In additional news, the museum has launched an online exhibition on Issei artist Wakaji Matsumoto entitled “Wakaji Matsumoto – An Artist in Two Worlds: Los Angeles and Hiroshima, 1917 – 1944”. This exhibition highlights rarely seen early photographs of Los Angeles prior to WWII and of Hiroshima before the US dropped the atomic bomb all through the lens of photographer Matsumoto. This photographer documented the lives of Japanese immigrant farmers in rural Los Angeles during the early 1900s and created rare images of urban life in Hiroshima prior to the 1945 atomic bombing. Go to janm.org/wakaji-matsumoto to see this photo exhibit. 101 N. Central Ave. in Los Angeles, CA. 213-625-0414.
The Getty Museum currently has online selections from a rarely seen collection of “Japanese American photographs, 1920-1940” recently acquired by the museum. Try www.getty.edu.
The San Diego Museum of Art has the following – Upcoming – “Wonders of Creation: Art, Science and Innovation in the Islamic World” from September 7, 2024 – January 5, 2025. Ongoing are shows on the Arts of Iran and Arts of South and S.E. Asia. Also available in the masterpiece minute podcast series, you can hear Bay Area artist Ruth Asawa discuss working with printers at Tamarind Lithographs Workshop in “Exploring the Void” at https://www.sdmart.org. The museum is at 1450 El Prado in Balboa Park, San Diego.
The Bowers Museum has the following – On going is “MIAO: Masters of Silver” which features jewelry and textiles from China’s Guizhou province where the largest population of indigenous Miao people live. “Asian Comics: Evolution of An Art Form” now through September 8. 2024. “Sacred Realms:Buddhist Paintings by Shashi Dhoj Tula Chan” is ongoing. “Spirits & Headhunters-Art of the Pacific Islands is ongoing. 2002 North Main St. in Santa Ana, CA. 714-567-3600 or go to bowers.org.
The USC Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena, CA has the following – Puget Sound artist Humaira Abid’s exhibit entitled “Searching for Home” is on view from May 21 – August 18, 2024. Sculpted wooden creations chronicle the troubling specter of the global refugee crisis and its trails of ruined lives. Opening in the spring of 2025 will be “Kultura Ng Pilipinas: Nostalgia and Connection in Diaspora” with the work of Diane Williams, Ginto Seeds and Jasmine Orpilla. Curated by Eleanor Lipat-Chesler and Dr. Rebecca Hall. Ongoing is “A Momentous Moment in Time of Passage and Landing”, a mural by Dave Young Kim that is a mural celebrating the journey of immigrants who leave their homelands to find new places using the images of birds. “Crossroads – Exploring the Silk Road” is a permanent exhibit tells the story of centuries of cultural exchange stimulated by the movement of travelers and goods along the ancient trade route. 2680 N. Los Robles Ave. in Pasadena, CA. 626-787-2680or [emailprotected].
The Chinese American Museum presents “Origins: The Birth and Rise of Chinese American Communities” and a permanent exhibit of the Sun Wing Wo General Store and Herb Shop. 425 North Los Angeles St. 213-485-8567 or go to camla.org.
The New York Times recently did a feature story on the Los Angeles art gallery “Commonwealth And Council.” The gallery is known for representing a new generation of artists on the West Coast who push the envelope with experimental work that carries a philosophical energy and a sharp sense of satire. The gallery is run by Young Cheng and Kibum Kim. A large percentage of the artists represented are persons of color or queer. Current shows include – The work of Jesse Chun is on view from May 25 – June 29, 2024.3066 – West 7th St. #220 in Los Angeles. 213-915-0777.
Utah Museum of Fine Arts present the following shows – “Pictures of Belonging: Miki Hayakawa, Hisako Hibi and Mine Okubo.” Features more than ninety artworks of three American Artists who shared the distinction of being trailblazing women of Japanese descent from pre-WW II generations whose work should be better known. On view through June 2, 2024.The museum is in the Marcia & John Price Museum Building. 410 Campus Center Drive. Salt Lake City, Utah.801-581-7332 or try umfa.utah.edu. The exhibition continues on to the following locations. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C., November 15, 2024 – August 17, 2025. Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, Philadelphia, October 2, 2025 – January 4, 2026. Monterey Museum of Art, California, February 5 – April 19, 2026. Japanese American National Museum, Los Angeles, California,late 2026.
The Honolulu Museum of Art presents the following – “Kekumu Aupuni:The Foundation of Hawaiian Nationhood” on view through August 4, 2024. “Fashioning Aloha” is a survey of aloha wear from the 1930s to the present and goes on view April 12 – September 1, 2024. “Miyabi – Renaissance of Court Culture” looks at the grandeur of Edo culture and is on view through July 28, 2024. A show of Japanese woodblock prints is ongoing. Also ongoing is “Likeness: Realistic Portraits by Shunsho ad Sharaku. “Kapulani Landgraf ‘Au’A” presents the photographer’s portraits of native Hawaiian leaders with text by Haunani-Kay Trask. On view through September 15, 2024.900 South Beretania St. 808-532-8700 or try honolulumuseum.org.
The Denver Art Museum presents the following – “Islands Beyond Blue – Niki Hastings McFall & Treasures from the Oceania” is an ongoing exhibition. Celebrated contemporary artist McFall will create site-specific work in conversation with the arts of Denver Art Museum’s Oceania Collection. “Perfectly Imperfect-Korean Bun heong Ceramics is ongoing. Photography by Fazal Sheikh is in a show entitled “Fazal Sheikh: Thirst/Exposure/In Place” which documents projects made on the Colorado Plateau. Opens March 10, 2024.100 W. 14th Ave. Parkway in Denver, CO. 720-865-5000 or www.deverartmuseum.org.
The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston has the following – “Shaping Abstraction”, a show of ceramic sculpture by Toshiko Takaezu on view through September 29, 2024. Opening March 24 and remaining on view through July 28, 2024 is “Hallyu! The Korean Wave”,a look at current Korean fashion. 465 Huntington Ave. Boston, MA. 617-267-9300 or go to mfa.org.
The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA has the following ongoing exhibits – “South Asian Art”,”Asian Export Art”, “Double Happiness Celebration in Chinese Art”, “Japanese Art”, “Japanomania! Japanese Art Goes Global” and finally “Anila Quayyum Agha: All the Flowers Are For Me”. This Pakistani American artist creates precise, stylized floral forms to make a sculptural chamber of light and shadow. Her effort creates a sense of how women can reclaim and safely open up private space to invite others. 61 Essex St. in Salem, MA 816-745-4876 or go to pem.org.
The Minneapolis Institute of Art has the following –“The Shape of Time: Korean Art After 1989” on view through June 23. 2024. “Bizen: Contemporary Expressions of an Ancient Japanese Pottery” May 25, 2024 – February 16, 2025. “Year of the Dragon: Mystical Creatures of the Sky” is on view through May 5, 2024. ”Dwelling in Mountains: Reclusion in Chinese Landscape Painting – 1” is on view through December 8, 2024. 2400 Third Ave. S. Minneapolis, MN 888-642-2787.
WNDR Chicago presents the US debut of the “Yellow Dots Obsession”, a three-story infinity installation by Yayoi Kusama.1130 W. Monroe St. or try wndrmuseum.com.
The Art Institute of Chicago has the following – “Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists From Japan” on view through June 3, 2024. Includes work by Mishima Kimiyo, Tsuboi Asuka, Ogawa Machiko, Konno Tomoko, Aoki Katsuyo and Oishi Sayaka. “A Sign of Things to Come: Prints by Japanese Women Artists After 1950” on view through January 15, 2025. “Foreign Exchange: Photography Between Chicago, Japan & Germany, 1020-1960” from May 4, – September 9, 2024. 1111 South Michigan Ave./159 E. Monroe. Chicago, ILL. 312-443-3600.
The Cleveland Art Museum has the following on view – “Into the Seven Jeweled Mountain: An Immersive Exploration” is on view through September 29, 2024 and takes the viewer through vivid animation into a natural wonder with a soundtrack by noted Korean composer Yang Bang-ean. This Buddhist pilgrimage site is now part of North Korea and isolated from the rest of the world. “Six Dynasties of Chinese Painting” is on view through May 5, 2024.11150 East Blvd. Cleveland, Ohio. 216 – 421- 7350 or go to https://www.clevelandart.org.
MoCA Cleveland has the following – “Manabu Ikeda: Flowers From the Wreckage” on view through May 26, 2024.11400 Euclid in Cleveland, Ohio. 216-421-8671 or try Mocacleveland.org.
Ongoing is “Collection Highlight: Ceremonial Teahouse.” Philadelphia Museum of Art.2600 Benjamin Franklin Pkwy. 215-763-8100 or try www.philamuseum.org.
The Newark Museum has an ongoing exhibit entitled “From Meiji to Modern: Japanese Art Goes Global- The Art of Japan”. 49 Washington St., Newark, New Jersey. 973-596-6550 or try www.newarkmuseum.org.
“Full Circle: Toshiko Takaezu and Friends” is a group show by the great ceramic artist from Hawai’i that recently opened at Longhouse Reserve in East Hampton, New York. 631-329-3508 or try [emailprotected]. In related news, “Beyond Form” is an online web site highlighting the work of Takaezu created by David Zwirner Gallery. Go to davidzwirner.com for details.
“Porcelains in the Mist: The Kondo Family of Ceramacists” looks at a noted Kyoto-based family of ceramic artists who have carried on a legacy of innovation in the ceramic arts. On view through December 8, 2024.Opening April 5 and running through August 4, 2024 will be “Hiroshige’s Famous Views of Edo (featuring Takashi Murakami)”. This famed museum collection of Hiroshige prints is viewed through the eyes of ordinary people who populate the settings and places in Tokyo. Contemporary artist Takashi Murakami contributes his own interpretation of the series with a set of his own new paintings. The Brooklyn Museum at 200 Eastern Parkway.718-501-6326 or brooklynmuseumn.org.
Pakistani sculptor Huma Bhabha has four figurative sculptures in a series entitled “Before the End” at Brooklyn Bridge Park at 334 Furman St. Ongoing.
“Journeys” is the title of photographer Tamiko Nishimura’s U.S. debut solo show on view through June 29, 2024 at Alison Bradley Projects. Nishimura was part of the vibrant avant-garde scene of 1970s Tokyo. Her work has a haunting quality with a profound emotional dimension. 526 – West 26th St. #814 in New York City, NY. Try alisonbradleyprojects.com for details.
Paris-based artist Huong Dodinh has her first solo show in the U.S. at the Pace Gallery on view through August 16, 2024. Her family fled Vietnam during the Indo-Chinese war for Paris. Her work has a soft palette from early figurative work to later austere, abstract compositions of lines, forms and space. 540 West 25th St. in Manhattan.
The work of Naomi Nakazato is included in a group show entitled “Color for New Voices: Ritual” “New Voices” is an open-call program that provides opportunities for a curator-selected presentation of art to eight artists. Curated by Olivia Shao who will write an essay for the catalog.On view June 6 –August 24, 2024.At the Print Center New York at 535 W.24th St. in New York City. 212-989-5090 or try printcenternewyork.org.
Korea Society has the following – “Home Away” is a group show featuring the work of Jian Yoo, Heejung Cho and Simpson Kim. Three Korean artists ponder what home means to them in this fast changing global environment through the mediums of sculpture, photography and contemporary mother-of-pearl art. May 21 – July 31, 2024. Regular hours are M-F, 10am – 4:30pm by appointment only but you must make an appointment at least 24 hours in advance by contacting [emailprotected]. 350 Madison Ave.-24th Floor. New York City. 212-759-7525
China Institute in New York presents the following – “Shan Shui Reboot: Envisioning Landscape for a Changing World” through July 7, 2024. 100 Washington St. in New York City.212-744-8181 or try chinainstitute.org.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City has the following –“Indian Skies: The Howard Hodgkin Collection of Indian Court Paintings” on view through June 9, 2024. “Vision and Verse: The Poetry of Chinese Painting” on view through June 16, 2024.”A Passion for Jade” on view through January 4, 2026. “Embracing Color: Enamel in Chinese Decorative Arts, 1300-1900” on view through January 4, 2026.”Celebrating the Year of the Dragon” is on view through January 2025. 1000 Fifth Ave. 212-535-7710. Go to https://www.metmuseum.org. In related news, the museum announced items from Cambodia and Thailand that were featured in the museum’s galleries were stolen goods. All were linked to a Khmer art collector later charged as a trafficker. They will be returned to their countries of origin The museum also recently announced some upcoming public art commissions. Lee Bul, the South Korean sculptor has received a commission to install her work on the Fifth Avenue façade of the museum. Taiwanese calligrapher Tong Yang-Tse will present her first public commission outside of Asia. Two of her large calligraphy projects will wrap around the museum’s Great Hall.
Asia Society has the following – On view through August 11, 2024 will be “Coal+Ice – Inspiring Climate Action Through Art And Ideas”. Co-curated by Susan Meiselas and Jerome de Vries. A series of events, performances and films will take place during the run of the show. Following this, “Madayin: Eight Decades of Aboriginal Bark Painting from Yirrkala” will be on view from September 17, 2024 – January 5, 2025. In related news, Asia Society recently hosted their annual Asia Arts Game Changer Awards, honoring five exceptional female artists and architects for their contributions to artistic environmental activism. Those honored included Rina Banerjee, Minouk Lim, Maya Lin, Toshiko Mori and Anicka Yi. 725 Park Ave. in New York City.212-327-9721 or try www.asiasociety.org.
Japan Society has the following – “None Whatsoever: Zen Paintings from the Gitter-Yelen Collection” on view from through June 16, 2024.333 East 47th St. New York, New York.212-715-1258 or try japansociety.org.
MOCA has the following – ”With a Single Step” on view through December 31, 2028. “Five Senses of Chinatown” on view through May 26, 2024. 215 Centre St. New York City. +1-855-955-MOCA or [emailprotected].
The Noguchi Museum presents the following. On view through July 28, 2024 is a major retrospective on the work of Toshiko Takaezu coming on the centennial anniversary of the artist’s birth. This exhibition will tour and there will be a major monograph on her work published by Yale University Press. The show will go to Cranbrook Art Museum during 2024-25, the MFA Houston in 2025 and the Honolulu Museum of Art in 2026. There will also be a complementary large-scale installation of her work at MFA, Boston in 2026. 9-01 33rd Road. Long Island City, New York. 718-204-7088 or [emailprotected].
New York City-based Ippodo Gallery has the following – “Laura de Sanfillana: Echoes of her gaze – Impressions of Tokyo & Kyoto in Glass” on view through June 29, 2024. Hours are M-W by appointment only and Th. – Sat. from 11am – 6pm. 32 E. 67th St., 3rd floor in New York City.212-799-4021 or [emailprotected].
The Dai ichi Arts Ltd. presents the following – “Earthly Forms – Ceramic Works by Hiruma Kazuyo & Matsutani Fumio” June 13 – 28, 2024. 18 E. 64th St. – Ste. 1F in New York City. +212-230-1680. Go to daichiarts.com for details.
Joan B. Mirviss LTD presents “Layered Clay” is a group show featuring the work of Matsu Kossei, Miyash*ta Zenji, Ogata Kamio and others is on view May 1 – June 21, 2024. 39 E. 78th St. Suite 401. New York, New York. 212-299-4021 or try [emailprotected].
The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art has the following –“Imagined Neighbors: Japanese Visions of China 1680-1980” on view through September 15, 2024. “Park Chan-Kyong: Gathering” through October 13, 2024. “Setting the Bar: Arts of the Song Dynasty” is ongoing. “Looking Out, Looking In: Art in Late Imperial China” is ongoing. “Staging the Supernatural- Ghosts and the Theater in Japanese Prints” runs through October 6, 2024. 1050 Independence Ave. S.W in Washington D.C. 202-633-1000.
The Chinese American Museum has opened in Washington DC. It’s the only museum in the nation’s capitol dedicated to the Chinese American story – its history, culture and voice.Currently on view – Ongoing are these shows. “Bruce Lee: American Son and International Icon” and “Fashioning Identity in Qi Pao: The Image of Modern Women.” The museum had an exhibit tour of their exhibition “Golden Threads – Chinese Opera in America” which is now available on you tube for viewing.1218 – 16th St. NW. 202-838-3180.
“MUCA – Icons of Urban Art through June 2, 2024. “Afro-Mingei by Theaster Gates until September 1, 2024. Tokyo City View “JO1 in Wonderland” until May 6, 2024. At the Mori Arts Center in Tokyo, Minato City, Roppongi, 6 Chome-10-1, Roppongi Hills, Japan. +8150-5541-8600 or www.mori.art.museum/jp/.
Tokyo National Museum presents the following – “Honen and Pure Land Buddhism” April 16 – June 9, 2024. “Rei Naito: Come And Live – Go And Live” June 25 – September 22, 2024.”Jingoji: The Dawn of Shingon Buddhism” July 17 – September 8, 2024. 13-9 Ueno Park, Taito – Ku, Tokyo. 110-8712 or www.tnm.jp.
Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo has the following – “Tokyo Contemporary Art Award 2022 – 2024” on view March 30 – July 7, 2024. MOT is located in Kiba Park at 4 Chome -1-1, Miyoshi, Koto-ku, Tokyo. +81-50-5541-8600 (Hello Dial) or try mot-art-museum.jp.
The Yamatane Museum presents the following –“Are You a Dog Person or a Cat Person?” features work by Tawaraya Sotatsu, Takeiuchi Seiho, Leonard Fujita to Yamaguchi Akira on view through July 7, 2024. “Special 25th Memorial Exhibition: Higashiyama Kai and Summer in Japan” on view through September 23, 2024.KS Bldg.1 F, 2 Sambancho, Chiyoda Ku, Tokyo. 102-0075. 81+3-5777-8600 or try www.yamatane-museum.jp/english.
Kyoto National Museum presents the following – “Honen and Pure Land Buddhism” from October 8 – December 1, 2024.”Japan: An Artistic Melting Pot” through June 15m 2024. “Commemorating the 430th Memorial of Toyotomi Hidetsugu & Zuisen-Ji Temple” June 18 – August 4, 2024. “Commemorating the Acquisition of the Ueda Collection – The Artistry of Esoteric Buddhist Iconography”, August 7 – September 8,2024. “Serpentine Delights: Celebrating the Year of the Snake” January 2 – February 3, 2025. 2024.527 Chaya-cho, Higashiyama-ku, Kyoto.075-525-2473 or kyohaku.go.jp.
Ota Memorial Museum of Art re-opens in April 2024 with a show entitled “Tsukioka Yosh*toshi – One Hundred Views of the Moon”.1-10-10 Jingu-Mae, Shibuyaku, Tokyo. +81-(0) 50-5541-8606 or try ukiyoe-ota-muse.jp.
The Shoto Museum has the following –“Junichi Nakahara: Year 111” is on view in two parts June 29 –November 10, 2024. Nakanara was a multi-talent in the areas of illustration, magazine editing and fashion/interior design. The show celebrates the 111th anniversary of his birth. There will be a show of the self-taught wood sculptor Suda Yashihiro November 30, 2024 – February 2, 2025.2-14-14 Shoto, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo. +81(3) 3465-9421 or try shoto-museum.jp.
The Toyama Prefecture Museum of Art & Design presents the following – “MINGEI – The Beauty of Everyday Things” from July 13 – September 23, 2024. “The 14th International Poster Triennialin Toyamaz’ from October 12 – December 15, 2024. “Yoshiaki Tono & Postwar Art” from January 25, 2025 – April 6, 2025. Tono was a prominent art critic of the post-war era.3-20 Kibamachi, Toyama, Japan. +81-76-431-2711 or go to tad-toyama.jp.
Nature Morte Gallery has the following – “Battle Royale – Neeraj Patel, Basist Kumar, Nidhi Agarwal & Ayesha Singh” in their Dhan Mill location through June 23, 2024.”Parallel Cities II – Group Exhibition” on view through July 6, 2024 in their Dhanraj Mahal location. Go to www.naturemorte.com for complete details.
“Words & Pictures” is an online exhibition presented by The Center for Fine Art Photography. The show combines two mediums – words and images—to tell a story. The work of California photographer Jerry Takigawa is included in this show which is live now and available for online viewing through January 31, 2025.
Performing Arts
Asian American and Pacific Islancer Heritage Month ends on Bainbridge Island with the 1st Annual Bainbridge Island Asian Arts and Heritage Festival with food, live entertainment and a raffle. Free. On Saturday, June 1, 2024 from 11am – 4pm. 7566 High School Rd. N.E. at the Filipino American Community Hall. For details, go to BainbridgeIslandCreativeDistrict.org.
“Unrivaled” is a play that shows two of Japan’s most beloved writers in bitter rivalry. Murasaki Shikibu versus Sei Shonagon. By Rosie Narasaki and Directed by Mimi Katano. Co-produced by SIS Productions & Seattle Public Theater. May 10 – June 2, 2024. Seattle Public Theater. 7312 W. Green Lake Dr. N. in Seattle. For details, try seattlepublictheater.org.
Pacific Northwest Ballet presents “George Balachine’s Coppelia” May 31 – June 9, 2024. Also includes “The Times They Are Racing” by Justin Peck, a new dance by Jessica Lang & Edward Liang’s “The Veil Between Worlds”. November 1 – 10, 2024 is an “All Balanchine” program. “The Nutcracker” plays November 28 – December 28, 2024. For more information, call 206-441-2424, in person at 301 Mercer St or online 24/7 at PNB.org. Pacific Northwest Ballet PNB Principal Dancer James Yoichi Moore had announced his retirement after a 20-year stint with the company. He was promoted to soloist in 2008 and principal in 2013. His two decades with the company will be celebrated at the Season Encore Performance on Sunday, June 9, 2024 at McCaw Hall.321 Mercer St. at Seattle Center.206-644-2424 or PNB.org.
The Wing presents their annual speaker series on Wednesdays, August 2 – 30, 2024 held from 12 – 12:30pm at Hing Hay Park Pavillion. August 2 has Noran Chan, Founder of Seniors in Action. August 9 has Paul DeBarros, local music historian and author of “Jackson Street After Hours.” August 16 has Dr. Third Andresen, UW Faculty member who is Chief Curriculum Developer for the Pioneering Filipnx American Curriculum and Principal investigator for the 206 Hip Hop Archive. August 23 has Rachtha Danh, Community hero Property Mangement and Community Initiativees at SCID PDA. August 30 is Meilani Mandery, CID community activist and artist coalition. For information, go to wingluke.org.
Seattle Opera has the following – Set for Tagney Jones Hall/The Opera Center is “Monkey & Francine in the City of Tigers” which fuses folktales from India, China & West Africa. This production is suitable for youth. June 8 & 9, 2024. Music by Kamala Sankaram and words by David Johnston. McCaw Hall is at 321 Mercer St. at Seattle Center. Go to Seattle Opera.org or call 206-389-7676 for details.
Seattle singer/songwriter Tomo Nakayama reprises his recording “Fog On The Lens” which he created at Town Hall over ten years ago. On Friday, June 7,2024 at 7:30pm in the Great Hall. 1119 Eighth Ave. Go to townhallseattle.org for details.
Some highlights from Seattle Symphony’s up coming season include the following –Tianyu Lu conducts Seattle Symphony in a program headlined by Tchaikovsky’s Symphony no. 4 September 26, 28 & 29, 20, 2024. Majel Connery’s Elderflora on September 27, 2024 is a World Premiere. It features Felix Fan on electric cello, Connery on voice and synthesizers and Noah Kalina contributing photography. Sunny Xia conducts the Symphony on October 19, 2024 in a performance of “Dia De Muertos”. October 25, 2024 features Bora Yoon’s composition {{{Phonation}}} with Yoon on voice, percussion, violin and keyboard and Joshue Ott with live video manipulations. The title program for November 21 & 23, 2024 of Faure’s “Requiem” has Kazuki Yamada conducting the Symphony. Takemitsu’s “Requiem for String Orchestra” is also on the program. Of particular interest is a program on November 22, 2024 entitled “COMPOSING IRAN” which features musicians from the Symphony performing a new multimedia/audiovisual work and also a world premiere by Deniz Tafa*ghodi. Also on the program is “Fabric of Sorrow” by Golnaz Shariatzadeh. Moving on to the Xmas holidays, we have a Holiday Pops concert on December 6, 7 & 8, 2024 with Anthony Parnther conducting and Chloe Flower on piano with the Seattle Symphony. Sunny Xia conducts Seattle Symphony for a few holiday programs. She will be in the pit conducting when the film “Home Alone” screens with a Seattle Symphony live soundtrack December 13, 14 & 15, 2024. Xia also conducts on December 14, 2024 in a program entitled “The Snowman” with the Symphony and the Northwest Boychoir, Apprentices. Virtuoso violinist Midori arrives January 23, 25 & 26, 2025 in a program entitled “MIDORI PLAYS BRAHMS” with the Seattle Symphony. On March 22, 2025, Sunny Xia conducts the Symphony in a program entitled “A Trip to Outer Space”. Xian Zhang is the guest conductor for “Holst The Planets: An HD Odyssey” March 27, 29 & 30, 2025. Daniel Bernard Roumain’s composition “Redemption Songs & Sonatas” is the program on March 28, 2025 with the composer on violin and spoken vocals and Yayoi Ikawa on piano and keyboard. Electrifying and passionate pianist Nobuyuki Tsujii returns to Seattle on April 3, 5 & 6, 2025 to headline a program with the Seattle Symphony in a program entitled “Nobuyuki Tsujii Plays Rachmaninov”.Esther Yoo is the solo violinist in a Seattle Symphony rendition of “Dvorak New World Symphony” set for April 10, 11 & 12, 2025. On the same night’s program is also Raymond Yu’s “Violin Concerto” which is also a Seattle Symphony Co-commission. Sunny Xia conducts the Symphony in their rendition of “Vivaldi The Four Seasons” and Helen Kim is guest violinist. The Gulli Bjornsson composition “LJOSID (LIGHT)” is the main program for May 2, 2025. Bjornsson provides the visuals in this Seattle Symphony Co-commission & World Premiere. Chinese musician JIJI performs on electroacoustic guitar & electronics. Vinay Parameswaran conducts the Symphony in a program entitled “Songs & Dances of India” on May 3, 2025. World-renowned cellist returns to Seattle on May 8, 2025 in a program simply titled “An Evening With Yo-Yo Ma And The Seattle Symphony”. Composer/conductor Tan Dun returns to Seattle for a program on May 15 & 16, 2025 entitled “Tan Dun Conducts Nu Shu: The Secret Songs Of Women”. Star violinist Hilary Hahn returns to Seattle in a program entitled “Hilary Hahn Plays Beethoven” with Xian Zhang conducting the Symphony on June 12, 14 & 15, 2025. Benaroya Hall is at 200 University St. 206-215-4747 or go to seattlesymphony.org.
Ukelele virtuosa Jake Shimabukuro makes a welcome return to Puget Sound with his “Holidays in Hawai’i” concert set for this fall on November 16,2024 at the Pantages Theater. Expect songs from his latest album entitled “Grateful.” In Tacoma at 901 Broadway. 253-591-5894.
Bob Antolin/Chet Corpt Duo perform wth Lion of Judah Band in a series entitled “Sounds From Around The World” on June 1, 2024 from 1pm – 5pm in Roxhill Park located at 2850 SW Roxbury St. in Seattle. This is a free family event. Bob Antolin’s Comfort Food Band plays The Firehouse Performing Arts Center on Wed., June 12, 2024 at 6:30pm. 1314 Harris Ave. in Bellingham,WA. Try www.reverberation.com/comfortfood for details. The band celebrates “Ernesto Pediangco’s Birthday Bash” at Sheridan Market’s Roadhouse on June 21, 2024 at 6:35pm 15348 Bothell Way N.E. in Lake Forest Park,WA. 206-550-4879 or try sheridanmkt.com. They also play on Thursday, July 18 at 6pm at Seattle’s Waterfront Park. For more information, try [emailprotected]. Bob Antolin performs on sax/flute/guitar in an informal setting entitled “Solo Excursions” ongoing on Wednesdays from 6 – 8pm at EmbassySuites Lounge & Bar at 3225-158th Ave. SE in Bellevue. Go to https://soundcloud.com/brightmoments/crystal-silence for details.
Pagdiriwang Philippine Festival takes place June 1 & 2, 2024. The Tibet Fest takes place August 10 – 11, 2024. The Diwali Lights of India Festival takes place November 2, 2024. The Seattle Hmong New Year Festival takes place on November 9, 2024. All of the above happen at Seattle Center Armory at 305 Harrison St. in Seattle.
Japanese jazz trumpeter Takuya Kuroda brings his mixture of post-bop, neo soul, hip hop and electronica to Jazz Alley on June 4 & 5, 2024. 2033 – 6th Ave. in downtown Seattle. 206-441-9729 or try [emailprotected].
All girl K-Pop group ITZY take their 2024 world tour “Born to Be” to the WAMU Theatre on June 6, 2024 at 8pm in Seattle. 800 Occidental Ave. S. 206-381-7848.
Shafi Hossain is a comedian and writer. He is currently co-host of the podcast, “Culture Clash Comedy Podcast.” He performs July 20, 2024 at 7pm and 9pm at the Here-After located at 2501 1st Ave. Go to ticketweb.com for details.
Portland Taiko travels up to this area to perform a concert at Tacoma’s Rialto Theatre on March 29, 2025. 310 South 9th St. Try https://www.tacomacitytheaters.org.
Portland Opera will have the world premiere of “Shizue: An American Story” in the fall of 2024. Composed by Kenji Oh with a libretto by Dmae Lo Roberts, it tells the story of haiku poet Shizue Iwasaki who married a strawberry farmer in Hood River, Oregon. Like thousands of other Japanese Americans, she experienced both hope and horror in America from the luscious taste of fresh strawberries on their farm to the injustice of America’s incarceration camps. For details, try Portland opera.org.
Go to Nonsequiter’s website to listen to free links by local musicians performing original music at waywardmusic.org. Carol J. Levin on electric harp engages in a series of “Duo Improvisations” with Susie Kozawa who plays various sound objects. Jackie An performs music for violin and electronics. Sovan is an ambient music duo featuring songwriter Tomo Nakayama and film composer Jeramy Koepping. Classically trained pianist and designer Tiffany Lin plays a piano program of originals in this series. Local sound artist Susie Kozawa has a piece she did invoking the space at the Chapel. Percussionist/composer Paul Kikuchi explores new music. Choreographer/dancer/singer Haruko Crow Nishimura performs a new vocal piece. Other performers include Leanna Keith, Nordra, Ahmed Yousefbeigi, Mother Tongue with Angelina Baldoz, trumpeter Cuong Vu and drummer Ted Poor, the wife/husband classical duo of Melia Watras and Michael Jinsoo Lim, Joshua Limanjaya Lim, Rahikka & James Lee, Kaoru Suzuki and Chris Icasiano with more to follow. The Chapel Performance Space at Good Shepherd Center has re-opened and is now booking again various kinds of adventurous/experimental music. Go to waywardmusic.org for details.
Due to popular demand, Brenda Wong Aoki’s latest work “Soul of the City” will return for more performances. Live performance and filming at the Presidio Theatre in San Francisco on June 1, 2024 at 7pm and again on June 2, 2024 at 4pm. Go to [emailprotected] for details.
The cover story for the May 2024 issue of Earshot Jazz profiles local trumpeter Carter Eng as written by Paul Rauch. In the same issue is a profile of South Indian violinist Ganesh Rajagopalan by Devon Leger.
The May 2024 issue of Downbeat Magazine has a profile of Northwest trumpeter/composer Riley Mulherkar by Alexa Peters. In the March 2024 issue of the magazine new recordings by saxophonist/composer Jon Irabagon (“Survivalism” & “Recharge The Blade”) and pianist/composer Charles Chen (“Charles, Play!”) are reviewed.
Film & Media
“Evil Does Not Exist” is the new film by Ryunosuke Hamaguchi, Oscar-winning director of “Drive My Car”. It tells the story of a remote lakeside village about to be overtaken by a new “glamping” site built on sensitive natural land. Screens May 26 – 28, 2024 at SIFF Cinema Egyptian. 805 E. Pine St. Lee Chang-Dong is a major Korean writer turned director and SIFF Uptown screens four of his early films. In “Oasis”, a released convict meets the daughter of the man he accidentally killed in an earlier hit-and-run and the couple enter into a relationship. June 14, 16 & 18. 2024. “Peppermint Candy” is a reverse trip through a man’s life before he commits suicide. June 14, 15 & 18. In “Green Fish”, a former soldier returns to his hometown only to fall in with gangsters. Screens June 15,16 & 17, 2024.And finally “Poetry” tells the story of an older woman with early dementia who discovers a heinous family crime just when she takes a poetry class. Screens June 15, 16 & 17, 2024. 511 Queen Anne Ave. N. As well known pop musician and film composer Ryuichi Sakamoto was dying of cancer, he performed one last concert that was filmed privately by his son. This concert film entitled “Oasis” screens at the SIFF Film Center on June 14, 15 & 16, 2024. 167 Republican St. in Seattle Center.06-464-5830 or go to siff.net.
Grand Illusion Cinema has the following – Toshio Matsumoto’s “Funeral Parade of Roses” is regarded as a key work of Japanese new wave and queer cinema that takes the viewer into the Tokyo night world of drag queen bars. Screens June 1,2,3 & 5,2024.1403 N.E. 50th St. 206-523-3936 or [emailprotected].
Northwest Film Forum has the following – Akira Kurosawa’s “Dreams” is a series of eight mythic vignettes that mirror the director’s own nighttime visions as well as stories taken from Japanese folklore. Screens May 29, 30 & June 1 & 2, 2024. “When the Apocalypse Is Over: Queer Philippines Shorts” explores new ways of seeing Philippine myths, pasts, presents and futures as these directors imagine the absurd, alienating worlds and lonely characters longing for something outside the limits of the frame.Screens May 29, 30 and June 1 & 2, 2024. 1515 – 12th Ave. 206-329-2629.
At the Cannes Film Festival , The Grand Prix Prize went to Payal Kapadia’s “All We Imagine as Light”, a drama about three women and how their lives intertwine in contemporary Mumbai.
“Sight” by Andrew Wyatt stars Terry Chen as Dr. Ming Wang who endured a traumatic childhood during the Chinese Cultural Revolution to become a renowned eye surgeon. In theatres now.
The Written & Spoken Arts
The Kingdoom Committee & Asian American Studies 498 present a Book Premiere event for the book, “KINGDOOM – How Protests Saved Seattle’s Chinatown” on Saturday, June 1, 2024 from 1 – 3pm. At Rainier Arts Center at 3515 South Alaska St. in Seattle. Appetizers will be served at this free event and all those who attend will get a free book. For more information, email [emailprotected].
Town Hall Seattle has the following spoken word offerings – Rental Partner: Neighborhood House Washington presents “What Matters Most”, a fundraising event for this non-profit with Vietnamese American author, playwright and performer Susan Lieu with Janice Deguchi, Executive Director of Neighborhood House and KUOW host Angela King. On Friday, May 31, 2024 at 5pm in The Great Hall. THS & Systems Biology present Anjali Nayar & Dr. Sean Gibbons discussing “Hack Your Health-The Secrets of Your Gut” on June 13, 2024 at 7:30pm in The Wyncote Northwest Forum. “Replay Matinee” re-aires a video of Ruchika Tulshyan talking about her book “Inclusion On Purpose” on June 13, 2024 at 1:30pm. Free in Wyncote. Khushbu Shah, author of a new Indian cookbook talks with Lauren Ko on June 18, 2024 at 7:30pm in The Great Hall. Town Hall Seattle has two theatres. The Wyncote Northwest Forum is for smaller events and the entrance is on Seneca. The Great Hall is for larger events and the entrance is on Eighth Avenue. The street address is 1119 Eighth Ave. Try townhallseattle.org for details.
Elliott Bay Book Company has a full slate of events in their reading series. Here are a few – Amy Tan in a change up from her usual fiction, reads from her new non-fiction book entitled “Backyard Bird Chronicles” complete with her art work about her observations of birds in her backyard. On Wed., May 29, 2024 at 7pm at the Seattle Central Library’s Microsoft Auditorium co-sponsored by Elliott Bay. Also on May 29 at 7pm at the store, poet Sally Wen Mo makes her fiction debut with “Ninetails”, short stories that re-imagine the fox spirit prevalent in many Asian cultures. On Sunday, June 9, 2024 at 7pm, two new writers will appear and discuss their books with Sierra Nelson. Leanne Dunic’s “WET” tells the story of a transient Chinese American model stranded in Singapore navigating the space between place and placelessness. Isaac Yuen’s Utter Earth” is a book of essays on sloths, lichen and other quirks of nature. Rachel Khong discusses her latest novel “Real Americans” with local memorist Molly Wizenberg on Monday, June 10, 2024 at 7pm at the store. The story is about a fifteen year old boy who leaves his Washington island in search of his biological father. Co-editor Premal Dharia discusses “Dismantling Mass incarceration” with Tarra Simmons on Thursday, July 25, 2024 at 7pm.For making reservations to the virtual events, go to elliottbaybook.com and click on the “Events Page” or call toll-free at 1-800-962-5311. Some events may be virtual and accessed through eventbrite.com. 1521 – 10th Ave. Local # is 206-624-6600.
Third Place Books serves the Puget Sound with three different locations in Lake Forest Park, WA., Ravenna and Seward Park in Seattle. They have the following literary events. All events are free but registration required. Seattle University professor & writer Sonora Jha discusses her novel “The Laughter” (just out in a new paperback edition) with Claire Dederer on Thursday, June 6, 2024 at 7pm at Ravenna. The novel is a portrait of privilege, radicalization, class and modern academia. Lindsay Ellis reads from “Apostles of Mercy”, the third book of her Noumena series on Thursday, June 20, 2024 at 7pm at the Lake Forest Park store. Storytime features South Asian children’s authors. Suma Subramaniam who reads from “My Name is Long as a River” and Vikram Madan who reads from “Zooni Tales: A Friend Till The End” on Sunday, June 23, 2024 at 2pm at the Lake Forest Park store. Here are the locations and contacts of the Third Place Books bookstores. Lake Forest Park at 17171 Bothell Way NE #A101 in Lake Forest, WA. 206-366-3333. Ravenna location in Seattle is at 6504 – 20th Ave. NE. 206-525-2347.Seward Park location in Seattle is at 5041 Wilson Ave. S. 206-474-2200. For details and information, go to thirdplacebooks.com.
2024 Pagdiriwang Festival presents five Filipino American poets and a Tanaga Poetry workshop. On Saturday, June 1, 2024 at 1pm, catch Joel Barroquiel Tan, Gerie Ventura, Devin Cabanilla, Ebo Barton and Oscar Penaranda in a reading followed by a poetry workshop of tanaga, a short poetic form endemic to the Philippines. Curated by Robert Francis Flor. Enjoy the riches of Filipino American literature at this free event. At Seattle Center at 1pm on June 1, 2024. For details, email [emailprotected].
Clarion West presents a series entitled “Summer of Science Fiction and Fantasy 2024”,a must for fans of speculative fiction and fantasy. Among the speakers are these – Science fiction/fantasy author Usman T. Malik appears on Tuesday, June 18, 2024 at Hugo House at 1634 – 11th Ave on Capitol Hill. Malik is the author of “Midnight Doorways:Fables from Pakistan”. Ruoxi Chen is a Hugo Award-winning book editor based in New York City. She engages in conversation with Molly Templeton on Thursday, July 18, 2024 at 7pm at Third Place Books in Seattle’s Ravenna neighborhood. 6504 – 20th Ave. N.E. To register for this event, go to [emailprotected].
Village Books in Bellingham,WA. has the following book events. Immigrant rights activist and author Silky Shah appears on behalf of her book entitled “Unbuild Walls” on June 16, 2024 at 6pm. A group poetry reading by Northwest poets Julene Tripp Weaver, Arlene Naganawa and Susan Landgraf takes place on June 29, 2024 at 4pm. Seattle author/artist Josh Tuininga appears on behalf of his new graphic novel “We Are Not Strangers” that tells the story of his father’s friendly relationship with a Japanese American friend at the dawn of WWII when Japanese Americans on the West Coast were herded into incarceration camps. On September 13, 2024 at 6pm. 1200 – 11th St. Go to villagebooks.com for details.
The Spring 2024 issue of “Viewpoint – Telling the Story at the University of Washington” has for a cover story “Finding The Words – Aiieeeeee! and It’s 50-Year Literary Legacy” and a profile on Eastside artist Cheryll Leo Gwin. Both articles are by Shin Yu Pai.
The winners of the 2024 Artist Trust Fellowships include the following. Literary artists include Joyce Chen. Performing artists include Janani Balasubramanian, Ai-Chun Huang, Fumi Amano and Jiemei Lin. Congratulations!
Even though Eastwind Books no longer has their brick and mortar location, they continue their online presence and author readings series. To stay in touch with Eastwind Books go to www.asiabookcenter.com.
The University of Washington Press is seeking writers working on a manuscript or new book proposal. UW Press editors are eager to connect with current and prospective authors about new projects and book proposals. Contact them via email of set up a meeting by phone or Zoom. Executive Editor is Lorri Hagman at [emailprotected].
BOOKS FOR REVIEW- The list below is a partial and ever changing list of new books by or about Asian Americans and new titles on Asia that have come in. Some may be already taken but many are still available. If you or anybody you know might be interested in reviewing any of these books, please let me know.
“Where Rivers Part – A Story Of My Mother’s Life” (Atria) by Kao Kalia Yang.”A beautiful, poetic narrative that neverthe less gives true weight to the trauma suffered by Hmong people during and after the Vietnam War. By placing the loss of mothers and of children at the center of the story, the author helps us see history in a whole new way.” – Jane Taylor McDonnell
“Roaming” (Drawn & Quarterly), a graphic novel by Jillian & Mariko Tamaki. “A masterful telling of a story we almost never get about young Asian American people experimenting with love, selfhood, sex, affection, artistic ambition, personal ambition all while looking for the friends who can see you through.”-Alexander Chee
“The Selkie” (The Song Cave) by Morgan Vo is this poet’s debut. The main character is a fish monger in the market buying and selling fish from his stall while all around him the poems touch upon topics of racial capitalism, cultural ties to animals and food, dislocation, diaspora, and the impacts of the nuclear family.
“The Silk Dragon II” (Copper Canyon) – Translations of Chinese Poetry by Arthur Sze. “True to the title of the book, each poem is a miniature silk dragon, lustrous and magical in its beauty. Even specialists of Chinese poetry will have much to learn from it.”-Michelle Yeh.
“Real Americans” (Knopf) by Rachel Khong. From the author of “Goodbye Vitamin” comes a novel of American identity that spans three generations in one family and asks: what makes us who we are? And how inevitable are our fortunes?
“Just Another Epic Love Poem” (Dial) by Parisa Akhbari. “A beautiful love story and a poignant coming-of-age tale a bout healing an learning to forgive. With lyrical prose, stunning poetry. And unforgettable characters, Akhbari’s debut is a must read.” – Adiba Jaigirdar
“When My Mother Is Most Beautiful” (Hanging Loose) by Rebecc Suzuki. “This book is a cosmology of identity, and a bouquet of elegiac questions across time and space. Woven with matrilineal care. I loved how this collection fused poetry, prose, and radical translation under one glimmering moon. – Jane Wong.
“Secrets Of The Sky – The Ghost Forest” (Scholastic) by Sayantani Dasgupta. This is volume three of this popular series. The Kingdom Beyond is overrun with ghosts who live in trees. The twins Kiya and Kinjal offer the best hope of finding a solution but this time, they face danger from even those they are trying to help. Can they find out who is destroying the ghost forest?
“The Truth About Dragons” (Henry Holt) by Julie Leung and illustrated by Hanna Cha. This warm celebration of mixed cultural identity is enhanced by lavish illustrations as it tells the tale of two grandmothers who teach a boy that in two different forests are two different, but equally enchanting truths.
“Village In The Dark” (Berkley) by Iris Yamash*ta. Detective Cara Kennedy thought she’d lost her husband and son in an accident, but harrowing evidence has emerged that points to murder—and she will sto at nothing to find the truth.
The Night Ends With Fire (Penguin Random House) by K. X. Song. Mulan meets The Poppy War in this epic romantic fantasy. Inspired by the legend of Mulan and steeped in rich Chinese mythology this book is a femibist story about a woman who refuses to let her life be determined by the men around her
“Hedgehog and the Log” (Union Square Kids) written and illustrated by Pam Fong. Hedgehog loves his new home. But before he can set foot inside, his house is destroyed. Hedgehog is powerless to change the situation. Or is he? With its tender, openhearted text and beautifully rendered illustrations, this picture book is about the power to choose how we see our world.
“Markless” (Levine Querido) by C. G. Malburi. This is a Sapphic, enemies-to-lovers ramantsy set in a whorld where the mark on your hand determines your power, your status, and your future spouse…unless you’re willing to defy all the rules and the godsthemselves.
“Hair Oil Magic” (Bloomsbury) by Anu Chouhan is a beautiful picture book about the joyful magic in the South Asian tradition of hair oiling and a celebration of the bond between parent and child.
“Bao Family Cookbook-Recipes From The Eight Culinary Regions Of China” (Interlink) by Celine Chung & Team with photos by Gregoire Kalt. Through over 80 classic yet accessible and playful recipes, the author and her team push back against the stereotypes surrounding Chinese cooking and pay tribute to its diversity and regionality.
“Zodiac- A Graphic Memoir” (Ten Speed Graphic) by AiWeiwei with Elettra Stamboulis and illustrated by Gianluca Costantini. Inspired by the twelve signs of the Chinese zodiac and their associated human characteristics, Ai Weiwei masterfully interweaves ancient Chinese folklore with stories of his life, family and renowned career in art and activism.
“Dancer Dawkins And The California Kid”(University of Washington) by Willyce Kim with a foreword by Eunsong Kim. When initially published, this campy Western novel was one of the first works of fiction by an Asian American woman author that was a celebration of queer joy during the darker Vietnam War era in California. This reprint is part of the “Classics Of Asian American Literature Series-A Shawn Wong Book.
“36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem” (Knopf) by Nam Le. “Each poem stings as if Nam Le burned syllables onto the page with a pyrographic pen. These poems seethe and sing; they shapeshift as Le tries to find a mode of speech or form that could capture the violent history of war and the experience of deracination. But the English language stops short and he captures the gap—and the unspeakable realms of racialized consciousness—with virtuousic and ineffable beauty.” – Cathy Hong Park
“The White Fox” (Holt) by Yangsze Choo. 1908, Manchuria. A courtesan is found frozen in a doorway and her death is clouded by rumors of foxes, which are believed to lure people by transforming themselves into beautiful women and handsome men. The detective Bao has an uncanny ability to sniff out the truth and has always been intrigued by the fox gods but will this case elude him? A stunning novel abut old loves and second chances, the depths of maternal love and ancient folktales that may very well turn out to be true.
“When an Elephant Hears NO” (Page Street Kids) by Dazzle Ng and illustrated by Estrela Laurenco. When elephants are little, they need to know that NO can mean an enormity of things. This kid’s picture book romp of encounters with the trickiest of tiny words will stamp out NO’s mysteries and trumpet its virtues with a whole elephant’s worth of fun.
“The Phoenix Crown” (William Morrow) by Kate Quinn & Jamie Chang. A thrilling and unforgettable narrative about the intertwined lives of two wronged women—spanning from the chaos of the San Francisco earthquake to the glittering palaces of Versailles. With this book, the authors mine an often overlooked era of history and bring much needed inclusivity to the genre.
“The House Before Falling Into The Sea”(Penguin Young Readers) by Ann Suk Wang and illustrated by Hanna Cha. This debut picture book by Wang and an award-winning illustrator is a poignant story about a child and her family who take in refugees during the Korean War. This deeply personal story is based closely on the author’s family history and shines a light on the plight of refugees and the importance of community.
“A Very Chinese Cookbook – 100 Recipes From China & Not China (But Still Really Chinese)” (America’s Test Kitchen) by Kevin Pang and Jeffrey Pang. “I love this father and son exploration of Chinese cuisine especially because it focuses on so much on their Hong Kong heritage. The handing down of recipes is so rare and a powerful way to keep our culinary culture rich and vibrant. This work is an important addition for every Chinese cookbook library.” – Grace Young
Fran Si-Chi’s First Love Paradise (HarperVia) by Lin Yi Han as translated by Jenna Tang. The most influential book of Taiwan’s #MeToo movement—a heartbreaking account of sexual violence and a remarkable reinvention of the trauma plot, turning the traditional “Lokuta” narrative upside down as it explores women’s vulnerability, victimization, and the lengths they will go to survive. Available June 2024.
“Piano Loves To Play” (Page Street Kids) written and illustrated by Colleen Kong-Savage. Piano and Amy share a special bond. Piano loves to ply music with Amy. And Amy loves Piano, too. When Amy has less time to play, Piano feels abandoned and lonely. With its portrayal of the lasting connection between instrument and musician, this heartfelt story will bring joy to huge audiences of piano players and all who have know the uplifting power of music.
“The Lost Souls of Benzaiten” (Soho Teen) by Kelly Murashige. This YA debut novel begins with an eccentric premise as a teenage girl—crushed by heartbreak, shame, and loneliness—offers this desperate prayer for change. What follows is the powerful story of a despairing teen who finds a way to reconnect with the world and rediscover its many small beauties. This book offers a fresh twist on Japanese mythology, a candid exploration of mental health, and a beautiful journey of healing.
“Lost Stick” (Viking) written and illustrated by Anoosha Syed. Louise starts up a game of fetch with her dog Milo When Louise fakes Milo out by pretending to throw Stick, Milo thinks she went long and takes off to bring the stick back. A series of hilarious and heartwarming miscommunications takes the dog on a global game of fetch, but along the way, he learns that home is where he really wants to be.
“Andaza – A memoir of food, flavor and freedom in the Pakistani kitchen” (Murdoch Books) by Sumayya Usmani. This evocative and moving food memoir –which includes the most meaningful recipes of the author’s childhood—tells the story of how her self-belief grew throughout her young life allowing her to find her own path amidst the expectations of following in her father’s footsteps as a lawyer and the pressures of a Pakistani woman’s presumed place in the household.
“The Translator’s Daughter – A Memoir” (MAD CREEK BOOKS) by Grace Loh Prasad. Born in Taiwan, Prassad was two years old when the threat of political persecution under Chiang Kai-shek’s dictatorship drove her family to the United States setting her up to become a “accidental immigrant.” As the author recounts her journey to reclaim her heritage, it unfurls themes of memory, dislocation and loss in all their rich complexity. The result is a unique immigration story about the loneliness of living in a diaspora, the search for belonging, and the meaning of home.
“The Books of Clash – Vol. 1” (First Second) by Gene Luen Yang, Les McClaine and Alison Acton. This graphic novel is a new series set in the world of “Clash of Clans” and “Clash Royale”. See the 9llustrated exploits of one young Hog Rider and his trusted companion in an unpredictable tale of fantasy and adventure. “The Books of Clash – Vol. 2” (First Second) by the same authors is a story of the illustrated exploits of an outcast on her quest to become the greatest archer of them all. Read how she acquires a magical scroll that will change her life forever.
“The Last Emperor Revisited – Behind-The-Scenes Photography” (Hong Kong University Press) by Basil Pao. Besides stunning photographs of the set and characters in costume for this film by Pao, there are short essays on how the film came about by director
Bernardo Bertolucci, producer Jeremy Thomas, cinematographer Vittorio Storaro and costume designer James Acheson.
“The Shadow & The Ghost” (Levine Querido) by Cat Min. Shinbi is not a particularly ghosty ghost At night she likes making tiny bouquets ofthings and gaing at the far away stars. Greem is a lonely rock who longs for someone to talk to. How these two meet and become friends is the tale in this beautifully illustrated picture book.
“Portland’s Audacious Champion – How Bill Naito Overcaem Anti-Japanese Hate and Became an Intrepid Civic Leader” (OSU Press) by Erica Naito-Campbell. In this first biography, Bill’s granddaughter shows how his story is also the story of Portland, the city he loved. Naito’s life, from the Great Depression and WWII through Portland’s rebirth in the 1970s and its profound growth, tracked most of the major events in the city and was the catalyst for many of them.
“Rangikura” (Knopf) Poems by Tayi Tibble. At once a coming-of-age and an elegy to the traumas born from colonization, especially the violence enacted against Indigenous women, this book interrogates not only the poet’s pain but also that of her Maori ancestors.
“Bangtan Remixed – A Critical BTS Reader” (Duke) – edited by Patty Ahn et. Al. “This book centers the band BTS and considers it as an outlier in the K-Pop industry, the focus of immense fandom, a transmedial phenomenon of brand, marketing, and world-making and a musical act whose style is exemplified across song lyrics, music video, concerts, rapping and dance. This volume is a timely and necessary work.” –Christine Bacareza Balance
“I Would Meet You Anywhere – A Memoir” (Mad Creek Books) by Susan Kiyo Ito “An intimate, deftly told story illuminating adoption’s complications and losses. This book is sure to move anyone who has ever felt rootless, questioned their place within their family,or longed for deeper self-understanding.”-Nicole Chung
“blood loss – A Love Story Of AIDS, Activism. And Art” (Duke) by Keiko Lane. “This book travels back through the heart of AIDS Activism with fierce love and a dazzling, devotional desire to bring the story back to life. What I found in these pages was history, memory, hope, fight, and a heart beating, not beaten. This book is a brilliant love letter to those we lost and a message for all of us who remember. We must keep telling the stories for those who carry on next.”-Lidia Yunavitch
“One Summer Day – A Child’s Memories Of Hiroshima” (OSU Press) by Hideko Tamura Snyder. Hideko was ten years old when the atomic bomb devastated her home. In this eloquent and moving narrative, she recalls her life before the bomb, the explosion itself , and the influence of that trauma upon her subsequent life in Japan and the United States.
“Lunar New Year – A Celebration of Family an Fun” (Golden Books) by Mary Man-Kong and illustrated by Michelle Jing Chan. Dancing dragons, glowing lanterns, delicious food, and new red clothes are just some of the traditions of a Lunar New Year depicted in this picture book.
“Stories of the Islands” (Holiday House) by Clar Angkasa. In this collection, debut graphic novelist Angkasa takes three folktales from her childhood in Indonesia and gives them back to the girl characters, following their hopes, dreams and journeys for freedom from natural and unnatural forces. Why should women in folktales be sidelined or reduced to tropes? What if we tell their stories instead?
“Fresh Juice” (Lee & Low) by Robert Liu-Trujillo. What do you need to make fresh juice? Carrots…collards…cayenne…and community! Join Art and his dad as they set out to find ingredients for a tasty, healthy juice—and discover a whole lot more. A charmingly illustrated picture book.
“The Storm We Made” (Marysue Rucci Books) by Vanessa Chan. A harrowing historical novel that plumbs the depths of love and the brutality of war while addressing notions of colonialism, classicism, racism and misogyny. This book looks at the story of a Malaysian mother who becomes an unlikely spy for the invading Japanese forces during WWII—and the shocking fallout that rains upon her community and family as a consequences.
“Drawing Deena” (Salaam Reads) by Hena Khan. A tenderhearted middle grade novel about a young Pakistani American artist determined to manage her anxiety and forge her own creative path. While her parents’ money troubles cause more and more stress, Deena wonders if she can use her artistic talents to ease their burden.
“Zains’ Super Friday” (Lee & Low) by Hena Khan and illustrated by Nez Riaz. Friday morning, Zain leaps out of bed ready to save the world from alien invaders! But his dad has other plans for this special day of the week. This picture book is a celebration of Muslim tradition and the joy of community.
“Made in Taiwan – Recipes and Stories from the Island Nation” (Simon Element) by Clarissa Wei with Ivy Chen. “This book is a timely, joyful rewriting of the Taiwanese story, at a time when this island’s very identity hangs in the balance. Clarissa’s fascinating journalistic insights are matched by her great efforts to deconstruct recipes passed down through generations.” Isobel Yeung, VICE News correspondent.
The ABCs Of Queer History” (Workman) by Dr. Seema Yasmin as illustrated by Lucy Kirk. This picture book takes readers ages 5 and up beyond simple ABC words to explore what it means to be accepting brave, compassionate and inclusive.
“Land of Milk And Honey” (Riverhead Books) by Pam Zhang. One woman’s discovery of pleasure alters her life and, indirectly the world. Moving from intimate longing to dangerous questions abut the ethics of privilege and wealth, this novel is a rapturous story about the transformative powers of pleasure, and one woman embracing her own appetite.From the author of “How Much Of These Hills Is Gold”.
“Rainbow Shopping” (Holiday House) written & brightly illustrated by Qing Zhuang. On a rainy afternoon a young girl and her mother travel to Chinatown to go food shopping for dinner. Inspired by the author’s experience as a first-generation Chinese American, this picture book explores how preparing and sharing a meal together can be a source of comfort and connection to loved ones, near and far.
“Zero Focus” (Bitter Lemon) by Seicho Matsumoto as translated by Louise Heal Kawai. First published in Japan in 1959, this book pushed the art of the mystery story to new dimensions In a radical departure from the fiction of its time, the novel centers on a female protagonist battling with the deeply misogynistic society of Japan in the 1950s. When a young bride’s husband disappears, she investigates.
“Exactly as Planned” (Rocky Pond) written & illustrated by Tao Nyeu. This tale about friends Fox and Moose is a charming, funny two-sided storybook, about expecting the unexpected and appreciating just being together in a nifty reversible format. Just flip the book over to start again from the other friend’s point of view.
“The Funeral Cryer” (Hanover Square) is a novel by SI Leeds Award winner Wenyan Lu.An unforgettable tragicomic tale of one woman’s midlife reawakening in contemporary rural China.
“American Precariat” (Coffee House) edited by Zeke Caligiuri and a collective of award-winning incarcerated writers. This groundbreaking anthology of essays edited by incarcerated writers takes a sharp look at the complexity and fluidity of class and caste systems in the United States. This collection situates each individual portrait within societal structures of exclusion, scarcity and criminality.
Joy Kogawa is one of Canada’s most respected poets and writers and the award-winning author of “Obasan”. Now McClelland & Stewart Press has published “from the lost and found department – new and selected poems” which includes selections from all her poetry books plus some new ones.
“Kadooboo!: A Silly South Asian Indian Folktale” (Page Street) by Shruthi Rao and illustrated by Darshika Varma. This modern retelling of a South Indian folktale blends playful wordplay with delightfully quick pacing in a story about friends, family, and food—the perfect recipe for a satisfying story time.
“A Glossary of Light & Shadow” (Diode Editions) by Esther Ra examines what it means to live as a human in a world rife with atrocities and unexpected grace. These poems explore the anguished affection and quiet resilience of human beings who are more than their trauma. Includes poems drawing from the author’s experiences working with North Korean refugees.
“Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir (FS&G) by local Tessa Hulls is a genre-defying journey into the heart of one family set again the dark backdrop of Chinese History It tells the story of three generations of women.
“Radio Days” (Black Ocean) by Ha Jaeyoun as translated by Sue Hyon Bae from the Korean. This collection of poems gives new life and magic to the everyday from humid childhood summers to the heartbreak of growing up and being alive.
“Gorgeous Gruesome Faces” (Roaring Brook) by Linda Cheng. This debut novel is a haunting look at love and fame in the K-pop world that finds that sweet spot between horror and romance. Traces the former friendship between two band mates before tragedy and heartache collide.
“The Premonition” (Counterpoint) is a novel by Japanese writer Banana Yoshimoto as translated by Asa Yoneda. This is a heartfelt story of a young woman haunted by her childhood and learning both the pain and peace that come from knowing he truth. When she moves in with a mysterious aunt, some things become clear.
“The Corrected Version (Diode Editions) by Rosanna Young Oh. This collection of poems is an immigrant narrative that ponders what it means to be an American. Who or what do we leave behind when we move to a new country? Who or what do we take with us? A book about survival, is also a journey made gentle by moments of love and compassion.
“Tiny Wonders” (Bloomsbury) by Sally Soweol Han is her debut author-illustrator picture book. A little girl remembers her grandma’s stories about the wonder in the world and the secret language of flowers. When she plants dandelions in town and the flowers sprout, she brings beauty back to her community.
“Every Drop Is a Man’s Nightmare” (Bloomsbury) by Megan Kamalei Kakimoto. Set in contemporary Hawai’i, this novel features a cast of mixed native Hawaiian and Japanese women under emotional, physical, and psychological duress. Centering the complex identities of native Hawaiian women, the collection examines the ways in which physical and emotional alienation take a toll on their psyches.Both a love letter to native women and a searing dispatch from an occupied territory summering with tension.
“Before We Say Goodbye” (Hanover Square) is a novel by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, author of the international bestseller, “Before the Coffee Gets Cold” and the fourth book in that series. A new set of visitors emerge who must answer the question, “Who would you visit if you could travel through time?” Translated from the Japanese by Geoffrey Trousselot.
“While Time Remains – A North Korean Defector’s Search For Freedom in America” (Threshold Editions) by Yeonmi Park. Park explored the saga of her escape from North Korea in “In Order to Live” and in this second book, she sounds the alarm on the culture wars, identity politics, and authoritarian tendencies that are tearing her adopted new home apart.
“Penguin and Ollie” (Bloomsbury) written and illustrated by Salina Yoon. In this colorful picture book of life under the sea, we find penguin searching the ocean for treasure when he meets Ollie, a shy octopus who comes out of hiding to join on the journey. What they discover is a treasure more precious than jewels.
“The Night Parade – A Speculative Memoir” Mariner) by Jami Nakamura Lin with illustrations by Cori Nakamura Lin. The author spent most of her life feeling monstrous for reasons outside her control. As a young woman with undiagnosed bipolar disorder, much of her adolescence was marked by periods of extreme rage and an array of psychiatric treatments, and her relationships suffered as a result, especially as her father’s cancer grasped hold of the family. This memoir draws around Japanese myths to shift the cultural narrative around mental illness, grief and remembrance.
“The Girl Before Her” (Kaya Press) by Line Papin as translated by Adriana Hunter and Ly Lan Dill. Uprooted without explanation from the sunshine and chaos of Ha Noi at ten, the female narrator finds herself adrift in the unfamiliar, gray world of France and grappling with a deep sense of uncertainty about who she is and where she belongs. Part mediation, part family history, part message in a bottle to her younger selves, Papin’s work explores what it takes to embrace one’s multiracial, transnational self by making peace with the generations of women who’ve come before. Co-published by Ink & blood, a new joint venture from Kaya Press and the Diasporic Vietnamese Artist Network (DVAN)which aims to bring Vietnamese literary voices from across the globe to English readers.
“Atom Weight” (Tidewater Press) by Emi Sasagawa. A young Japanese-Latina-Canadian woman is far from her Vancouver home in London with new life filled with study, friends and a tentative first relationship with a closeted Asian woman. But then a violent incident triggers an unexpected response. She finds that brutal bar-fighting relieves her stress. From then on, she lives a dual life – obedient and accommodating by day and brawling by night. An intimate novel about the need to reconcile competing cultures, traditions and values, while exploring issues of sexual identity and violence.
“When My Ghost Sings – A Memoir of Stroke, Recovery & Transformation” (Arsenal Pulp) by Tara Sidhoo Fraser. Fraser is thirty-two years old when a rare mutation in her brain causes a stroke. Awakening after surgery with no memory of her previous life, she attempts to piece it all back together through a haze of amnesia. Yet, as memories do begin to surface, they are seen through someone else’s eyes—the person whose body she stole, whom she calls Ghost.
“The Sunset Crowd” (St. Martin’s) by Karin Tanabe is a historical novel that follows an enigmatic young woman who ingratiates herself with a tight-knit group of glamorous, global friends in 1977 Los Angeles, and upends their lives as she chases the blinding lights of fame—at any cost.
“Rana Joon and the One & Only Now” (Antheneum) is a young adult novel by Shideh Etaat. Perfect Iranian girls are straight A students and always polite and respectable. But Rana Joon is different – she smokes weed and love Tupac and has a secret –she loves girls. When her best friend Louie who encouraged her to live in the moment, dies – she decides to enter a rap battle he dreamed of competing in even though the thought of public speaking terrifies her.
“Offshore Lightning” (Drawn & Quarterly) by Saito Nazuna. Translated by Alexa Frank with an introduction by Mitsuhiro Asakawa. The author became an illustrator almost by chance when a co-worker left and Saito replaced her. Originally an editorial illustrator for a Japanese newspaper, she came to comics first at the age of forty. To some, the lives of ordinary people appear static and unremarkable but not to Saito. Aging, death, and dying meet nostalgia, regret, and acceptance in this collection of shorts that balance humor with empathy.
“The Strange Beautiful” (Chin Music) by Carla Crujido. “These stories deliver lasting magic. Through the lives lived in Spokane’s Mt. Vernon apartments, through generations of unforgettable residents, Crujido weaves a spell of an injured soldier turned hotel worker, a mannequin given a chance at life, songbirds and bakers, lovers and oppressors. The ways the stories are interconnected is masterful. It’s difficult to believe this is a debut, and it’s one to be celebrated.” – Toni Jensen
“Chili Crisp”(Chronicle) by James Park with photography by Heami Lee. Chili crisp is a magical sauce that tingles with heat, crunches with fried garlic and onions, and slicks any food with oily goodness. James Park, food writer and chili crisp devotee, has created over 50 approachable and adaptable recipes to fill your whole day with chili crisp.
“The Peeling Of A Name (ELJ Eitions, LTD) – poems by Anhvu Buchanan.” Anhvu Buchanan brings his whole being into these poems. They are full of anger and yearning, pain and hope, rage and love. The rawness and the tenderness will stay with you. So will the poet’s name, as completely and utterly his own.” – Viet Thanh Nguyen
“ENLIGHTENED” (Antheneum Books for Young Readers) by Sachi Ediriweera. A spirited young prince desperate to learn more about the world grows into a man on a quest to find the cause of human suffering in this first-of-its-kind graphic novel biography about the life of Siddhartha, the founder of Buddhism. This is the first young adult biography about the life of the Buddha, and it follows him from his time as a young prince in the palace to his middle age, when he becomes the sage who is the founder of Buddhism.
“The Last Election” (Akashic) – by Andrew Yang and Stephen Marche. A gripping, intricately plotted political thriller set on the campaign trail of the USA’s next—and because of crucial flaws in the electoral system—its last election; from former presidential candidate Yang and author Marche. Set for September 13, 2023 publication.
“Ganesha’s Great Race” (Chronicle) by Sanjay Patel and Emily Haynes with illustrations by Patel. This picture book chronicles a race between Ganesha and his brother, Kartikeya. It’s a celebration of the bond between siblings and a loving tribute to family. Though Ganesha cannot compete in speed with his brother, he knows every problem has more than one solution.
“Leis And The Fire Goddess” (Penguin Workshop) by Malia Maunakea. This middle-grade novel tells the story of a part-Hawaiian girl from Colorado who goes back to Hawai’i to visit her Grandma and accidentally insults Pele the fire goddess. And when Pele kidnaps her best friend, she must undo the curse and learn her Hawaiian roots to save her friend and at the same time learn all of who she truly is.
“Earthly Order – How Natural Laws Define Human Life” (Oxford University Press) by Saleem H. Ali. “School’s all about teaching students about the basic order of life. But the education of order is not exactly an orderly education. Saleem Ali’s new book builds a bridge across the sciences using the scaffolding of natural laws, delivering the reader a unique and unifying perspective of life on earth.” – Lucas Joppa.
“Everyone Loves Lunchtime but Zia” (Knopf) by Jenny Liao and illustrated by Dream Chen. At home, Zia loves the Cantonese dishes her parents cook. But at school, she’s shy about eating her favorite foods since they smell different from her classmate’s lunches. This kids picture book is a mouthwatering celebration of Cantonese food and a heartwarming story a bout being your own authentic self.
“English As a Second Language And Other Poems” (Copper Canyon Press) by Jaswinder Bolina. Coated in an armor of wit and humor and steeped in the idiosyncrasies of language, this book pits sentimentality against cynicism and the personal against the national. What remains is the kaleidoscopic image of the modern American condition. Bolina skewers, laments, and celebrates America with intelligence and humility.
“Food For The Future – Sustainable Farms Around The World” (Barefoot Books) by Mia Wenjen as illustrated by Robert Sae-Heng. This picture book for children was born out of the author’s concern about climate change and what some farmers around the world are doing to combat that. In this book, young readers discover 12 amazing ways people around the globe grow food while caring for our planet.
“When Women Ruled the Pacific – Power and Politics in Nineteenth-Century Tahiti and Hawai’i” (Nebraska) by Joy Schultz. The author highlights four Polynesian women rulers who held enormous domestic and foreign power and expertly governed their people amid shifting loyalties, outright betrayals, and the ascendancy of imperial racism. In this first book to consider queenship and women’s political sovereignty in the pacific, Schultz re-centers the lives of women rulers in the history of nineteenth-century international relations.
“Cold Enough For Snow” (New Directions) by Jessica Au. Winner of the inaugural Novel Prize, this book is an elegant exploration of the mysteries of our relationships to others. A mother and daughter travel from abroad to Tokyo: they walk along the canals through the autumn evenings, escape the typhoon rains share meals in small cafes and restaurants, and visit galleries to see some of the city’s contemporary art. At once a careful reckoning and an elegy, this novel questions whether any of us speak a common language, which dimensions can contain love, and what claim we have to truly know another’s inner world.
“Your One And Only Heart” (Dial) is a picture book by Rajani LaRocca, MD as illustrated by Lauren Paige Conrad. This unusual book explains in clear terms to children why your one and only heart is special and unique just like you.
“Lady Tan’s Circle of Women” (Scribner) by Lisa See. The latest historical novel by this author inspired by the true story of a woman physician from 15th century China. A captivating story of women helping other women who were remarkable in the Ming dynasty and would be considered remarkable even today.
“Real to Me” (Knopf) by Minh Le and illustrated by Raissa Figueroa. This picture book depicts a child’s world and their imaginary friends. Others tried to tell me that my friend wasn’t real. But what did they know? She was real to me. When you have a great friend, the rest of the world can seem to disappear. Lavishly illustrated in bright colors.
“Beijing Sprawl” (Two Lines Press) by Xu Zechen as translated by Jeremy Tiang & Eric Abrahamsen. “Bored country kids, hutong hucksters, and gig economy slackers mingle with forgers, thugs, and former jailbirds populate Xu Zechen’s lyrical writing. Realism and Surrealism, tragedy and farce play out in the anonymous backstreets of Beijing’s seemingly endless urban sprawl. This is some of the most exciting and energized writing coming out of China now.” – Paul French
“Two New Years” (Chronicle) by Richard Ho and illustrated by Lynn Scurfield. For this multicultural family, inspired by the author’s own, two New Years mean twice as much to celebrate. In the fall, there’s Rosh Hashanah and in spring, comes the Lunar New Year. With joyful prose and luminous illustrations, readers are invited to experience the beauty of two New Year traditions.
“MUSHROOM HUNTING – Forage For Fungi And Connect With The Earth” (Chronicle),part of the “Pocket Nature” series. By Emily & Gregory Han. For the mycologically curious, here is a guide to finding fungi, whether in your backyard, a local park, or the woods. This book is a doorway to the mysterious and magical world of these earthy life-forms.
“Night Market Rescue” (Rocky Road) by Charlotte Cheng and illustrated by Amber Ren. A stray dog wanders into the magical world of Taipei’s night market only to discover a lost little girl. This evocative picture book invites readers into a exciting Asian night market.
“The Second Wave – Reflections On The Pandemic Through Photography, Performance And Public Culture” (Seagull Books) by Rustom Bharucha. Focusing on the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in India in 2021, the author’s timely essay reflects on four interconnected realities that haunted this crisis – death, grief, mourning and extinction. Against the destruction of nature and the disrespect for the nonhuman, this book offers lessons in resilience through its reflections on the ethos of writing and the need to re-envision breath as a vital resource of self-renewal and resistance.
“Dawn Raid” (Lantern) by Pauline Vaeluaga Smith and illustrated by Mat Hunkin. An ordinary Maori girl in New Zealand grows politically aware when she realizes her people are treated unfairly. She becomes a stirring public speaker with a voice that rings true.
“Purring, Rolling, Stretching” (Chronicle) by Chihiro Ishizu and illustrated by Nanako Matsuda. This board book for toddlers is a celebration of all things cat and perfect for young readers learning about a favorite family feline pet.
“C.C. Wang – Lines of Abstraction” (Hirmer). Edited by Wen-shing Chou and Daniel M. Greenberg, this is the catalog for a recent exhibition held at Hunter College Art Galleries. Born to a family of scholar officials at the end of Qing dynasty, Wang mastered traditional ink and brush techniques in Shanghai before he immigrated to New York in 1949. There, he sought to preserve the tradition of classical Chinese painting as filtered through his engagement with contemporary ideas, materials and forms.
“Can’t I Go Instead” (Forge) by Lee Geum-yi (“The Picture Bride”). Two women’s lives and identities are intertwined through WWII and the Korean War—revealing the harsh realities of class division in the early part of the twentieth century. In the aftermath of WWII, the women make their way home, where they must reckon with the tangled lives they’ve led, in an attempt to reclaim their identities and find their place in an independent Korea.
“A Plucked Zither”(Red Hen Press) by Poems by Phuong T. Vuong.Winner of the Red Hen Press Benjamin Saitman Award. This collection explores what happens to language and thus emotions and relationships under conditions of migration, specifically refugee migration from Vietnam and its aftermath. Vuong leans on the anti-war Vietnamese singer and songwriter, Trinh Cong Son for a poetic lineage on grief, longing, and justice.
“No One Prayed Over Their Graves” (Farrar Straus & Giroux) by Khaled Khalifa as translated by Leri Price. From this National Book Award finalist comes the story of two friends whose lives are altered by a flood that devastates their Syrian village. The poetic and horrific lie side by side in a world where Muslims, Christians, Jews, Greeks, Turks and Arabs overlook differences to forge friendships and family ties.
“Gas Mask Nation – Visualzing Civil Air Defense in Wartime Japan” (University of Chicago Press) by Gennifer Weisenfeld. This book explores the multilayered construction of an anxious yet perversely pleasurable visual culture of Japanese civil air defense—or boku—through a host of artworks, photographs, films and newsreels, magazine illustrations, postcards, cartoons, advertising, fashion, everyday goods, government posters and state propaganda. The author reveals the immersive aspects of this culture, in which Japan’s imperial subjects were mobilized to perform highly orchestrated civil air defense drills throughout the country.
“Superfan – How Pop Culture Broke My Heart” (McClelland & Stuart) by Jen Sookfong Lee. In this sharply observed and intimate memoir-in-pieces, the author turns her love affair with pop culture into a revelatory lens to explore family, identity, belonging, grief, and the power of female rage. Weaving together key moments in pop culture with stories of her own failings, longings and struggles, she navigates the minefields that come with carving her own path as an Asian woman, single mother, and writer.
“Nayra and the Djinn” (Viking) written and illustrated by Jasmin Omar Ata. In this stirring graphic novel, a young Muslim girl must contend with parental pressure from a strict family and exhausting friendship demands from the only other Muslim girl in class. Transferring schools seems to be the only viable alternative.
But then a djinn, a mythical being in Islamic folklore, appears and uses her powers and wisdom to guide the girl through her overwhelming life.
“The Liars of Nature and the Nature of Liars – Cheating And Deception In The Living World” (Princeton) by Lixing Sun. This book is a natural history of cheating from selfish genes to lying politicians. Human beings are not the only ones who deceive. In this book, Sun explores the evolution of cheating in the natural world, revealing how dishonesty has given rise to wondrous diversity.
“Tell Me Pleasant Things about Immortality” (Penguin Random House Canada) by Lindsay Wong (author of “The Woo-Woo”). Living forever isn’t everything it’s cracked up to be. The ghosts, zombies, and demons in this short story collection are shockingly human, and they’re ready to spill their guts. From Shanghai to Vancouver, the women in this collection haunt and are haunted—by first loves, troublesome family members, and traumatic memories.
“choosing to be simple – Collected Poems of Tao Yuanming” (Copper Canyon Press) as translated by Red Pine. This is a definitive portrait of this early Chinese poet and politician. It chronicles his path from civil servant to reclusive poet during the formative Six Dynasties period (220-589). As Red Pine illuminates the poet’s sensitive voice, we find his solace and sorrow in a China transformed by modernity.
“The Care and Keeping of Grandmas” (Tundra) by Jennifer Mook-Sang and illustrated by Yong Ling Kang. In this picture book story filled with humor, confusion and moments of sweetness, readers are introduced to a delightful family whose well-meaning daughter makes the transition for a grandmother to the family’s house as smooth as possible.
“Tauhou” (Anansi) by Kotuku Titihuia Nuttall. An inventive exploration of Indigenous families, womanhood, and alternate post-colonial realities by a writer of Maori and Coast Salish descent. “Tauhou” envisions a shared past between two Indigenous cultures, set on reimagined versions of Vancouver Island and Aotearoa that sit side by side in the ocean. It is a longing for home to return to the land and sea.
“Phantom Pain Wings” (New Directions) by Kim Hyesoon as translated from the Korean by Don Mee Choi. In these poems, the memory of war trauma and the collective grief of parting are depicted through what the poet calls an “I-do—bird sequence,” where “Bird-human is the ‘I.’” A simultaneity of voices and identities rise and fall, circling and exiting by their delayed wings of pain.
“Full Exposure” (Avon) by Thien-Kim Lam. A rom-com set in New Orleans during Mardi Gras as a Black American woman photographer from D.C. stumbles into a Vietnamese American man bent on making a documentary about his family’s involvement with this Southern tradition. When he offers to show her the real New Orleans, if she’ll help him with the camerawork – things get complicated.
“The Light Of Eternal Spring” (Random House Canada) by Angel De Zhang. Amy Hilton, born Wu Aimee in the tiny Chinese village of Eternal Spring, has been living and working as a photographer in New York City for so long she’s started to dream in English. When she receives a letter from her sister, she has to take it to a Chinatown produce vendor to get it translated, and that’s how she learns that her mother has died of a broken heart. The author creates a nuanced portrait of family lost and found, of the transformative power of art, and of the need to transform yourself in order to make art that’s true.
“My Paati’s Saris” (Kokila) by Jyoti Rajan Gopal and illustrated by Art Twink. Every day a young Tamil boy spends with his grandmother is filled with tenderness and a host of fun activities. But what he finds comfort in most is his Paati’s saris – whether he’s wrapped in their colors or clutching their folds. Each sari has a story that speak to him. Illustrated in sumptuous, brilliant colors.
“Ha Noi at Midnight” (Texas Tech University Press) by Bao Ninh and translated and edited by Quan Manh Ha and Cab Tran. Deeply felt stories the illuminate the interior landscape of a postwar country and the emotionally damaged lives of its soldiers and civilians. Considered one of Vietnam’s most important writers.
“The Forest Brims Over” (Counterpoint) is a novel by Maru Ayase as translated by Haydn Trowell set for July 2023 publication. A woman turns herself into a forest after long being co-opted to serve as the subject of her husband’s novels—this surrealistic fable challenges traditional gender attitudes and exploitation of women in the literary world.
Against a backdrop of iconic, ancient Hindu texts, “Burning Like Her Own Planet” (Alice James), the poet Vandana Khanna reimages the lives of Hindu goddesses through a contemporary, feminist lens. Told in a series of persona poems and dramatic monologues, the book re-invents these myths into essential stories of love, betrayal, and faith.
“The Little Green Envelope” (Groundwood) by Gillian Sze and illustrated by Claudine Crangle. A green envelope sits neglected in a drawer, dreaming of traveling to foreign lands across water and through the air but just gets overlooked. Until one day, the little girl Olive picks the little green envelope out of the drawer and the journey begins. An imaginative picture book for children about the joy of mailing and receiving a letter.
“Nothing Follows” (Texas Tech University Press)- Poems by Lan P. Duong.These poems mines memories from the trials of adolescence in a refugee household darkened by the shadows of war, displacement and unspoken grief.
Keiko Hara – Four Decades Of Paintings & Prints” (WSU Press) by Linda Tesner and Ryan Hardesty. The exhibition catalogue to a recently concluded retrospective at WASU for this Walla Walla-based artist and printmaker that reveals the diversity of interests and discovery this respected Washington artist has pursued in a career that spans decades. A sometimes overlooked artist who deserves greater recognition in this state.
“Horse Barbie” (The Dial Press) – A memoir by Geena Rocero. The story of a trans pageant queen from the Philippines who goes back in the closet to achieve success as a female model in New York only to lose sight of herself.
“Seeing: A Memoir of Truth and Courage from China’s Most Influential Television Journalist” (Astra House) by Chai Jing as translated by Yan Yan. This candid memoir from one of China’s best-known journalists provides a rare window into the issues which concern us most, and which face contemporary China and the whole world. In these essays, Chai recounts her investigations into SARS quarantine wards, a childhood suicide epidemic, the human cost of industrial pollution, and organized crime, while looking back at her growth as a journalist.
“Our Man In Tokyo-An American Ambassador And The Countdown To Pearl Harbor” (Mariner) by Steve Kemper. A gripping behind-the-scenes account of the personalities and contending forces in Tokyo during the volatile decade that led to World War II, as seen through the eyes of the American ambassador who attempted to stop the slide to war.
“Survivor Injustice – State-Sanctioned Abuse, Domestic Violence, And The Fight For Bodily Autonomy? (North Atlantic) by Kylie Cheung. Scheduled for Summer 2023 release. Explicitly abolitionist, Cheung explains not just how abusers get away with abuse, but how our laws, our politicians, our policies, and our law enforcement officials operate as the primary perpetrators.
“Excavations” (One World) by Hannah Michell. Sae is is housewife with two toddlers, waiting for her husband to come home from work. But terror and confusion reign when she hears of the collapse of a massive skyscraper where her husband is engineer. When she seeks to uncover the truth of what happened to her husband, this thriller throws her into a pit of confusion begging for answers.
“Sejal Sinha Battles Superstorms” (Aladdin) by Maya Prasad and illustrated by Abira Das. Sejal Sinha is serious about science so when a big strom threatens to ruin her family’s Diwali celebration, Sejal knows it’s her chance to go on an adventure—and prove to everyone how magical science really can be.
“Ghee Happy Gods _ A Little Board Book of Hindu Deities” (Chronicle) written and illustrated by Sanjay Patel. Meet the many faces (and arms) of the mighty Hindu gods! A charming and colorfully illustrated guide to the Hindu gods for the little ones.
“Ghee Happy Goddesses – A Little Board Book of Hindu Dieties” (Chronicle) written and illustrated by Sanjay Patel. Meet the many faces (and arms) 0f the mighty Hindue goddesses. A charming and colorfully illustrated guide to the Hindu goddesses for the little ones.
“Jasmine and Jake Rock the Boat” (Berkley) by Sonua Lalli. When two childhood enemies get stuck together on a seniors’ cruise with their Indian family & friends through the scenic Alaskan gulf, the friction is palpable. A story of family pressures, cultural traditions and self-discovery as opposites begin to attract in this teenage rom-com novel.
“Extreme Beauty – 12 Korean Artists Today” (artasiapacific). From this respected magazine on contemporary Asian art comes this book that looks at a group of independent Korean artists active on the global art scene. The artists introduced represent a variety of age groups, genres, and artistic styles and reflect the diversity that defines Korean art today.
“Ways Of Being” (MoonPath Press) by Sati Mookherjee. This Bellingham poet explores the outer island of the San Juan archipelago and writes evocatively of the drama of the sea and the tides that cover our Northwest coastline.
“Togani” (University of Hawai’i Press) by Gong Ji-Young as translated by Bruce & Ju-Chan Fulton.A powerful novel about abuse at a school for deaf children and the struggle for justice.
“Owlish” (Graywolf Press) by Dorothy Tse is a novel that spins a fable about the current political situation in Hong Kong translated from the Chinese by Natascha Bruce. “Beguilingly eerie, richly textured, the pages of “Owlish” are drenched in strange beauty and menace. Like all the best fairy tales,it reveals the dark truths that we would rather not look at directly, and does so with a surreal and singular clarity.” – Sophie Macintosh, author of “Cursed Bread”.
“Imposter Syndrome And Other Confessions of Alejandra Kim” (Crown) by Patricia Park. This young adult novel revolves around the lead character in the title who doesn’t feel like she belongs anywhere. At her wealthy Manhattan high school, her super-Spanish name and super-Korean face do not compute to her mostly white “woke” classmates and teachers. In her Queens neighborhood, she’s not Latinx enough. When a microaggresion at school thrusts her into the spotlight—and into a discussion she didn’t ask for—Alejandra must discover what it means to carve out a space for yourself to belong.
“Fractured Soul” (Harpervia) by Akira Mizubayashi as translated by Alison Anderson.A universal story about music and restoring one’s faith in others amid the aftermath of tremendous loss. Awarded the Prix des Libraries by France’s booksellers. It’s 1938 in Tokyo and a rehearsal by an amateur quartet is brutally interrupted. A young boy sees his father’s violin destroyed as he is arrested and taken away never to be seen again. Flash forward to a future where the boy becomes a luthier and struggles to reconcile his past with the present.
“A Quitter’s Paradise” (Zando) by Elysha Chang.The story of a young woman who finds herself hopelessly adrift after the death of her mother. As she tries to avoid her feelings, she makes outrageous choices. A study of beauty and the contradictions of grief, family bonds and self knowledge and how we unwittingly guard the secrets of our loved ones, even from ourselves.
“Once Upon a Book” (Little Brown) is a delightful picture book written by Grace Lin and Kate Messner and illustrated by Grace Lin. When a little girl tires of winter clouds and cold, she finds books are the perfect escape.
“From From” (Graywolf) by Monica Youn. “Where are you . . .? No—-where are you from from?” It’s a question every Asian American gets asked as part of an incessant chorus saying you’ll never belong here, you’re a perpetual foreigner, you’ll always be seen as an alien, an object or a threat. Youn brilliantly evokes the conflicted consciousness of deracination in this striking book of poetry.
From the “Hawai’i Studies On Korea” Series comes a graphic novel entitled “100 Degrees Centigrade – South Korea’s 1987 Democracy Movement” (University of Hawai’i Press) by Choi Kyu-sok. Translated by Madeline D. Collins, Gia Kim, Nguyen Thi Huong Ly, Jusun Pakr, Brooke Shelton, Anna Toombs, and Theodore Jun Yoo. Originally published in 2009, during a bleak era in Korean democracy, it gave hope to readers across the country. A book that tells the story of both the past and future of Korean democracy.
“Central Places” (Ballantine Books) by Delia Cai. A young woman’s stifling past and uncertain future collide when she brings her white fiancé home to meet her Chinese immigrant parents, toppling her carefully constructed life, in this vibrant, insightful debut from this new voice in contemporary fiction.
“The Pearl Hunter” (Balzer + Bray) by Miya T. Beck. The story revolves around identical twins who both have the same talent for pearl diving. But one is the obedient daughter and the other tries to push boundaries. Still, when one sister is stolen by the legendary ghost whale, nothing will stop the other from searching deep into the ocean to bring her home. Woven through with traditional Japanese stories, legends and strategy games.
“Love Makes a Garden Grow” (Simon & Schuster) written and illustrated by Taeeun Yoo. This poignant story revolves around a little girl and her grandfather who bond over a beautiful garden. But one day, the grandfather must move to an apartment and the girl moves far away. Despite these changes, it is still this love of flowers that connects them.
“Natural Beauty” (Dutton), a novel by Ling Ling Huang. This book follows a young classical musician who must abandon her musical ambitions to help her parents about a debilitating accident. To earn money to support them, she gets a job at a high-end beauty shop in New York where she soon learns that the obsession for beauty comes at a staggering cost.
“A Spoonful of Time” (Quirk) by Flora Ahn is a young adult novel about a little girl and her Korean grandmother who loves to cook but is losing her memory. But magically, by eating together, they travel through time and the little girl sees her grandmother as a young girl again.
“Chlorine” (Morrow) by Jade Song. “Ren Yu is a fierce young woman who’s dreamed of mermaids ever since she can remember—dreams so vivid that the first touch of water in a swimming pool alters her life forever, sending her down a path that’s both beautiful and frightening. “Chlorine” isn’t just a coming of age story. It’s the tale of transformation from human to something wilder and more transcendent. It’s a about love and longing and the willingness to do anything to become who you truly are.” – Richard Kadrey, author of the “Sandman Slim” series
“Danbi’s Favorite Day (Viking) written and illustrated by Anna Kim. This children’s picture book tells the story of Danbi who is thrilled to invite her friends to celebrate Children’s Day as she did in Korea. But when the reality of a picnic behind her parent’s deli falls short of her grand plans, she must get creative to save the day.
“Late Violent Call” (McElderry Books) is the title of two novellas by bestselling author Chloe Gong based on the events of “Foul Lady Fortune” and following a familiar cast of characters from “These Violent Delights”. In “A Foul Thing”, Roma and Juliette run an underground weapons ring in Zhouzhuang but when they hear about several Russian girls turning up dead in nearby towns, they decide to investigate. In “This Foul Murder” Benedikt and Marshall are summoned by Roma to find the elusive scientist Lourens and bring him to Zhouzhuang. But when someone is murdered on the Trans-Siberian Express they are riding on, they decide to investigate and find the murder may be related to their own mission as well.
“Oh My Mother! – A Memoir in Nine Adventres” (Viking) by Connie Wang. A road trip through a complex relationship between mother and daughter in nine essays as they travel around the world.
“Teeter” (Nightboat Books) by Kimberly Alido (set for July 2023 release) is an autohistory of felt time that arises from subversive hearing practices and the emotional prosody of a mother tongue one does not understand but activates in another poetic language.
“Pleasure of Thinking” (Astra House) – Essays by Wang Xiaobo as translated by Yan Yan. A newly translated English collection of his most influential nonfiction pieces, as well as rare diary entries offering insight into the author’s time studying in the United States. From his personal take on the intellectual failures of China’s Cultural Revolution era to musings about the future of the internet and science fiction cinema, Wang Xiaobo prods his readers, in a gentle, humorous way, to think about what it means to think.
“Hijab Butch Blues – A Memoir” (Dial) by Lamya H. tells the coming-of-age story of a queer, devout Muslim immigrant in pursuit of a life that can hold together her seemingly contradicting identities.
“Camp Zero” (Atria) – A novel by Michelle Min Sterling. In a near-future northern outpost, the fates of a young woman, a professor and a mysterious collective of climate researchers collide in this mesmerizing and transportive story of our future.
“Wandering Souls” (Henry Holt),a novel by Cecile Pin. After the last American troops leave Vietnam, three siblings journey to Hong Kong with the promise that their parents and younger siblings, will soon follow. But when tragedy strikes, the three children are left orphaned, and the sixteen-year old must become the caretaker for her two younger brothers overnight.
“Search for a Giant Squid” (Chronicle) by Amy Seto Forrester & Andy Chou Musser. This innovative picture book in concept and design takes young readers on an expedition to the ocean’s twilight zone in search of a giant squid. But readers are given choices in taking this expedition such as a choice of submersible, a choice of pilot and a choice of dive site. A fun way for kids to learn about the ocean below us and the creatures that inhabit that underwater kingdom.
“Legends Of Lotus Island – The Guardian Test” (Scholastic) and “Legends of Lotus Island – Into The Shadow Mist” Scholastic) form the first two volumes of a continuing series by Christina Soontornvat as illustrated by Kevin Hong. The first volume has our character Young Plum accepted into an elite school on an island where she’ll be trained with other kids how to transform into Guardians, magical creatures who are sworn to protest the natural world. Trouble is, Plum has trouble embracing her inner animal and if she can’t succeed, she will have to leave the school and lose the first group of real friends she’s ever known. In the second volume, Plum and her friends travel to misty Bokati Island to study with a mysterious Guardian Master. When an unseen force begins to destroy the trees, putting an entire ecosystem at risk, Plum and her classmates must respond. But how?
“I Can Open It For You” (Chronicle) written and illustrated by Shinsuke Yosh*take. Akira has a problem. He is too small to open packages by himself. He still needs grown-ups to help him. With humor and wit, Yosh*take explores a child’s feelings about growing up: the push and pull of relying on parents while striving to learn and do things by oneself.
“Tomb Sweeping”(Ecco) by Alexandra Chang. Compelling and perceptive, this book probes the loyalties we hold: to relatives, to strangers, and to ourselves. In stories set across the US and Asia, Chang immerses us in the lives of immigrant families, grocery store employees, expecting parents, and guileless lab assistants. These characters, adeptly attuned to the mystery of living invite us to consider whether it is possible for anyone to entirely do right by another.
“FEAST” (Alice James Books) by Ina Carino. This winner of a 2022 Whiting Award and a 2021 Alice James Award offers abundance and nourishment through language, and reaches toward a place an immigrant might call home. The poems here revolve around food and its cultural significance – examine the brown body’s relationship with nourishment. These poems delve into what it means to be brown in a white world, and how that encourages (or restricts) growth.
“One More Mountain” (Groundwood Books) is the fifth book in “The Breadwinner” series by Deborah Ellis. The series follows the story of young Afghan girls as they go through a series of life changes. In this volume, a young girl runs away to avoid being forced into a marriage by her family. A police officer takes her to a shelter and school for women and girls. All royalties from this book are donated to Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan.
“The Kingdom of Surfaces” (Graywolf) by Sally Wen Mao. In this book of poems, Wen Mao examines art and history and the provenance of objects such as porcelain, silk, and pearls —to frame an important conversation on beauty, empire, commodification, and violence.
“Zara’s Rules for Living Your Best Life” (Salaam Reads) by Hena Khan and illustrated by Wastana Haikal. This middle-grade novel is the third book in the series. Ever since her grandfather retired, it seems all he wants to do is eat and sleep and Zara wonders if he’s lost his mojo. Inspired by her friend Naomi’s summer day camp adventures, Zara comes up with a plan to create a camp of her own and somehow help her grandfather start living his best life.
“Tanya” (Knopf) – Poems by Brenda Shaughnessy. In this powerful gathering of poems about her personal “influencers,” as well as poems on a range of creators from the Dadaist Meret Oppenheim to the young choreographer Lauren Lovette, Shaughnessy dwells in the memories of the women who set her on her own artistic path.
“LOL 101 – A Kid’s Guide to Writing Jokes” (Chronicle Books) by David Roth and Rinee Shah and illustrated by Rinee Shah. This IS Not a book of jokes but it is a book that can help you write your OWN jokes. Perfect for kids who want to get serious about being funny.
“Decade Of The Brain” (Alice James) by Janine Joseph. In this deeply personal book, the poet writes of a newly naturalized American citizen who suffers from post-concussive memory loss after a major auto accident. This collection is an odyssey of what it means to recover—physically and mentally—in the aftermath of trauma and brain injury, charting when “before” crosses into “after”.
“EXILED – From the Killing Fields of Cambodia to California and Back” (Potomac Books) by Katya Cengel. This book follows the stories of four Cambodian families as they confront criminal deportation forty years after their resettlement in America. Weaving together these stories into a single narrative, the author finds that violence comes in many forms and that trauma is passed down through generations. With a new foreword by Cengel.
“You Are Here” (Counterpoint) by Karen Lin-Greenberg. This novel due out on May 2, 2023 tells the story of a once-bustling mall and its residents in upstate New York. As the institution breathes its last gasp, people inside it dream of something different,something more. This novel is a deeply humane portrait of a community in transition, ultimately illuminating the magical connections that can bloom from the ordinary wonder of our everyday lives.
“Wanna Peek Into My Notebook? – Notes on Pinay Liminality – Essays” (Paloma Press) by Barbara Jane Reyes. “Poet-teacher-kasama Barbara Jane Reyes defetishizes the creative politics of poetic life. Through a decade’s worth of intimate aurohistoria-teoria, Reyes documents the interiority of her previous books, chronicles the day of her father’s passing humbly mourns and uplifts mentors such as our beloved Al Robles, insistently questions who gets to tell the Pinay’s story, invites us into a deep genealogy of Pinay literature, and manifests a feminist poetics of dailiness, revision, re-thinking, and reckoning.” – Jason Magaboo Perez.
“Babajoon’s Treasure” (Simon & Schuster” by Farnaz Esnaashari and illustrated by Nabi H. Ali. A picture book story of a young Iranian American girl and the summers she spends with her grandparents. When a gold coin falls out of her grandfather’s pocket, the little girl wonders if he could actually be a pirate?
“Hard Is the Journey – Stories of Chinese Settlement in British Columbia’s Kootenay” (Caitlin Press) by Lily Chow. Award-winning historian and researcher Lily Chow shares the difficult history of Chinese Canadians in the Kootenay. She unearths the racism of early newspapers that portrayed Chinese immigrants as dirty, sinister, and lethargic and uncovers the history of Chinese laborers who completed the deadly work of blazing the Dewdney Trail only to be dismissed without compensation when the work was completed. This book is an intimate and inspiring look into the many ways Chinese immigrants survived, finding community, building resilience and preserving their culture.
“Bianca” (Four Way Books) by Eugenia Leigh confronts honestly personal trauma and mental illness, traversing childhood, young adulthood, marriage and new motherhood with poems that sear and heal.
“Malala Speaks Out” (Groundwood) is a book of talks by this teenage activist who came to prominence after speaking out about life under the Taliban and her family’s fight for girl’s education in Pakistan for which she was targeted and shot. She survived and continues her campaign for education. With commentary by Clara Fons Duocastella. Translated by Susaon Ouriou and illustrations by Yael Frankel.
Thanhha Lai is the author of “Inside Out and Back Again”, her debut novel in verse which won both a National Book Award and a Newberry Honor. Now she returns with a sequel to that book entitled “When Clouds Touch Us” (Harper). When Ha arrived in Alabama as a refugee from Vietnam, adjusting seemed impossible but in two years, she made friends and found a sense of belonging. Now her mother says they are moving to Texas and the young girl is devastated at the prospect of starting over.
“Poetry As Spellcasting – Poems, Essays, And Prompts For Manifesting Liberation And Reclaiming Power” (North Atlntic Books) by Tamiko Beyer, Destiny Hemphill & Lisbeth White.Both poetry and occult studies have been historically dominated by white writers: this book reclaims the centrality of queer and BIPOC voices in poetry, magic and liberatory spellwork. It reveals the ways poetry and ritual together can move us toward justice and transformation. Set for May 2023 publication.
“ALONE – The Journeys of Three Young Refugees” (Groundwood) by Paul Tom and Melanie Baillairge. Each year, more than 400 minors arrive alone in Canada requesting refugee status. They arrive without their parents, accompanied by no adult at all. This book relates the journey of three of them. “ALONE” is a fully illustrated adaptation of the critically acclaimed documentary film, “Seul” which has screened at film festivals around the world.
“Free Kid to Good Home” (Gecko Press) written and illustrated by Hiroshi Ito is an enduring Japanese bestseller now in its 31st edition which finally gets an American edition as translated by Cathy Hirano. When the only daughter of a Japanese family finds attention shifting away from her with the arrival of a baby brother, she revolts and runs away from home. She plants herself in a box on the sidewalk with a sign, “Free Kid to a Good Home”.
“Dancing With The Dead – The Essential Red Pine Translations” (Copper Canyon) by Red Pine. Considered one of the finest translators of Chinese poetic and religious texts, this new collection gathers over thirty voices from the ancient Chinese past such as Hanshan, Stonehouse, Wei Yingwu, Liu Zongyuan and Tao Tuanming as deftly translated by this Port Townsend resident, Bill Porter known by his pen name of Red Pine.
“Say Hello?” (Berbay Publishing) as written and illustrated by Sung Mi Kim and translated by Clare Richards. In cartoonish line drawings accented in blue and red, the author tells a light-hearted, comedic tale of two strangers and their increasingly awkward encounters and how saying hello right from the beginning could have made all the difference.
“one long listening – a memoir of grief, friendship, and spiritual care” (North Atlantic Books) by Chenxing Han, author of “Be the Refuge”. Immigrant daughter, novice chaplain, bereaved friend: Han takes us on a pilgrimage through the wilds of grief and laughter, pain and impermanence, reconnecting us to both the heartache and inexplicable brightness of being human.
“Happy Birthday To Me” (Groundwood) written and illustrated by Thao Lam. A child runs through a spectrum of emotions on the best day of the year —their birthday! Early-morning excitement gives way to shyness at the arrival of guests, hunger for cake, a craze for arts and crafts, and some real piñata problems. What can she say when she’s asked how it feels to be a year older?
“The Symmetry of Fish” (Penguin Books) by Su Cho is a National Poetry Series winner as selected by Paige Lewis. This debut poetry collection about immigration, memory and a family’s lexicon shines light on the Korean and Korean American imagination.
Kane Miller Publishing releases the first three books of a continuing series entitled “Tiger Warrior” by M. Chan. In “Attack Of The Dragon King”, “War Of The Fox of an ordinary schoolboy who is given a magical coin by his Chinese grandpa and thus learns that he is the new Tiger Warrior and it’s up to him to save the Jade Kingdom…and the world. Illustrations by Alan Brown. For ages 7 and up.March 2023 publication date.
“The Love Match” (Simon & Schuster) by Priyanka Taslim is a heartfelt rom-com about a Bangladeshi American teenage girl whose meddling mother arranges a match to secure their family’s financial security—just as she’s falling in love with someone else.
“Once And Forever – The Tales of Kenji Miyazawa” (New York Review of Books) translated from the Japanese by John Bester. Miyazawa was a poet, farmer and beloved spinner of tales whose sly, humorous, enchanting, and enigmatic stories bear a certain resemblance to those of his contemporary Robert Walser. Miyazawa had a deep connection to Japanese folklore and an intense love of the natural world with all its beauty, cruelty and contradictions.
“Looking Up: The Skyviewing Sculptures of Isamu Noguchi”(Giles) just concluded its run at Western Art Gallery in Bellingham. This exhibition catalog is the first major publication to take an in-depth look at the artist’s interest in outer space and charting our place in the universe. This book explores the artist’s long career as a sculptor who works with environments, from his early days in the studio of Constantin Brancusi into a context of younger generation of artists like Richard Serra and Nancy Holt. By Hafthor Yngvason, Matthew Kirsch and Kate Wiener.
“Night Lunch” (Tundra) by Eric Fan and illustrated by Dena Seiferling. When night descends, furry noses sniff the air as mouthwatering smells from a lavish lunch cart lure growling bellies toward a tasty bite. This magical ode to Victorian lunch carts is a nocturnal tale suitable for adults and the child in us. With compelling,mood-evoking artwork.
“Seeing Ghosts” (Grand Central Publishing) by Kat Chow. With a voice that is both wry and heartfelt, the author weaves together what is part ghost story and part excavation of her family’s history of loss, spanning three generations as they emigrate from China and Hong Kong to Cuba and America.
“Zen for Kids” (Bala Kids) by Laura Burges and illustrated by Melissa Iwai.This is a book of zen-inspired activities and stories to help kids learn about patience, kindness, honesty, sharing and forgiveness. Each chapter has a new story to explore, with themed discussion questions, meditations, journal prompts, and hands-on projects.
”Feast” (Alice James Books) by Ina Carino explores the intricacies of intergenerational nourishment beyond trauma, as well as the bonds and community formed when those in diaspora feed each other, both literally and metaphorically. At times located in the Philippines, at others in the US, the speaker of these poems is curious about how home can be an alchemy from one to the other. Carina is a winner of the 2022 Whiting Award in Poetry and the 2021 Alice James Award. Set for publication on March 7, 2023.
“Out of the Blue” (Dial Books for Young Readers)) written & illustrated by Nic Yulo. A colorful picture book that is a touching story on the universal emotion of feeling small in a big world and a unique friendship.
“Foul Heart Huntsman”(Margaret K. McElderry Books) is a new teen fiction title by Chloe Gong. It is the second book in a series following an immortal assassin in 1930s Shanghai as she races to save her country and her love amidst civil war and foreign expansion.
“A Life Of Service – The Story of Senator Tammy Duckworth” (Candlewick Press) by Christina Soontornvat and illustrated by Dow Phumiruk. In a tribute to an extraordinary woman, this picture book tells the inspirational and barrier-breaking life of Senator Tammy Duckworth. A good example of the story of female role model that young Asian American girls can look up to.
“All in a Day” (Berbay Publishing) written and illustrated by Chihiro Takeuchi. A fun book that teaches toddlers how to read time. Follow the comings and goings of everyone who lives and works in the same building and enjoy the interactive search-and-find as we see what happens throughout the day.
“Daodejing” (Liveright) by Laozi as translated by Brook Ziporyn. This is transformative new edition of Taoism’s central text that overturns its reputation for calming, gnomic wisdom, revealing instead in this new translation, a work of “philosophical dynamite”.
“The Shape of You” (Kids Can Press) by Muon Thi Van and illustrated by Miki Sato is an enchanting picture book that’s a meditation on the shapes that make up our lives and will change the way children see the world around them.
“Lady Joker – Volume One” (Soho Crime) by Kaoru Takamura. Translated from the Japanese by Marie Iida and Allison Markin Powell. In 1995, five men meet at the racetrack every Sunday. They have little in common except a deep disaffection with their lives, but together they represent the social struggles and dissapointments of postwar Japan. Intent on revenge against a society that values corporate behemoths more than human life, the five conspirators decide to kidnap a CEO of one of Japan’s biggest companies and extract blood money from the company’s financiers.
“this is not a Personal Statement” (Quill Tree) by Tracy Badua. Perla is graduating from a hypercompetitive high school but her dream is to enter a prestigious college that she and her parents have set their sights on. But when she is rejected and forges an acceptance letter in a panic, what will the future look like? A poignant, propulsive tale of acceptance, self-discovery, and the infinite possibilities that are possible when we embrace our imperfections.
“New Women of Empire – Gendered Politics and Racial Uplift in Interwar Japanese America” (UW Press) by Chrissy Yee Lau. A rare reveal of Japanese American young women of the Roaring Twenties who made indelible changes in public and private circles including expanding sexual freedoms, redefining women’s roles in society and furthering racial justice work.
“Until Nirvana’s Time-Buddhist Songs from Cambodia” (Shambhala) is the first collection of traditional Cambodian Buddhist literature available in English, presenting original translations of forty-five poems.
“Unsettled” (Harper) by Reem Faruqi is a middle grade novel in verse about a young Pakistani Muslim girl whose family moves to Georgia. Wanting acceptance, she tries to blend in yet stands out for all the wrong reasons – her accent, the color of her skin and her clothing. But when she joins the swim team, she finds the courage to stand up to bullies, fight for what she believes in and eventually find her place.
“Kanishka Raja- I And I”(Hirmer/the Davis) by Lisa Fischer. A book that formed the basis for an exhibition catalog. A look at the ravishing work of this experimental painter that in his own words, “explores the intersection of representation, craft, technology and the gaps that occur in the transmission of information.”
“If You Could See The Sun” (Inkyard Press) by Ann Liang. Alice Sun has always felt invisible at her elite Beijing international boarding school, where she’s the only scholarship student in a sea of wealthy classmates. Her plan is to get into a prestigious university, graduate with honors, secure a killer job and lift her family out of poverty. But plans turn to dust when her parents tell her they can no longer afford her tuition. Then she starts turning uncontrollably invisible.
“Daughters Of The New Year” (Hanover Square) by E. M. Tran. This novel is a spellbinding tale about the extraordinary women within a Vietnamese immigrant family and the ancient zodiac legend that binds them together.
“The Picture Bride” (Forge), a novel by Lee Geum-yi as translated by An Seonjae. It is 1918 and the matchmaker tells Willow her future husband is a landowner, food and clothing is plentiful and you will be able to go to school. But life in Hawai’i is hard and the future uncertain. Still she works tirelessly toward a better life for her family.
“The Porcelain Moon” (William Morrow) by Janie Chang. From the author of “The Library of Legends” comes a vividly rendered novel set in WWI France about two young women – one Chinese and one French –whose lives intersect with unexpected, potentially dangerous consequences. A tale of forbidden love, identity and belonging and what people are willing to risk for freedom.
“koho mori-newton/no intention” (Hirmer) by Herausgegeben Von Karl Borromaus Murr. Since the 1980s, this artist has forged his own unique path, along which he has questioned the very foundation of art itself. With a skeptical view of the construct of content, the artist uses various elements of paper, silk, frame or india ink as his materials to forge a new center for his artistic search.
Keigo Higashino is one of Japan’s most popular fiction writers as well known in that country as Stephen King of James Patterson is here in the U.S. His “The Devotion of Suspect X” was shortlisted for an Edgar Award for Best Novel. His latest offering “A Death in Tokyo” (Minotaur) as translated by Giles Murray has Tokyo Police detective Kaga trying to make sense of a most unusual murder.
“The Many Hats of Louie The Rat” (Owl Kids) written and illustrated by Sakshi Mangal. Louie the rat makes useful things out of recycled materials but no one pays any notice to his ingenuity until a flood comes.Lessons on practicality for kids.
“The Genesis of Misery” (Tor) by Neon Yang. An immersive, electrifying space fantasy, Neon Yang’s debut novel is full of high-tech space battles and political machinations, starring a queer and diverse array of pilots, princesses, and prophetic heirs.
“Where The Lost Ones Go” (FSG) by Akemi Dawn Bowman. Eliot Katayama is grieving for her paternal grandmother who just passed away. She desperately searches for any sign that ghosts are real and in that way, perhaps can hold on to her grandmother’s memory. When she discovers ghosts in Honeyfield Hall, she wants to help them remember their pasts and unlock the memory of her own grandmother.
“Fight Back” (Tu Books) by A.M. Dassu. A terrorist attack at a concert changes everything for Aaliyah, a Muslim teenager. Local racists are emboldened and anti-Muslim rhetoric starts cropping up in school and on the street. When her school bans the hijab she is wearing and she is attacked and intimated, she must fight back. But can she fight back and can she find allies?
“We Uyghurs Have No Say – An Imprisoned Writer Speaks” (Verso) by Ilham Tohti. This is a first collection of writings and interviews by one of the world’s foremost experts on Uyghurs and Chinese policy in Xinjiang. Now in prison, Tohti calls upon all people of conscience to stand in opposition to Islamophobia and the repressive policies enforced by current Chinese government authorities.
“Surface Relations – Queer Forms Of Asian American Inscrutability” (Duke) by Vivian L. Huang. In this book, the author trace how Asian and Asian American artists have strategically reworked the pernicious stereotype of inscrutability as a dynamic antiracist, feminist, and queer form of resistance. Following inscrutability in literature, visual culture, and performance art since 1965, Huang articulates how Asian American artists take up the aesthetics of Asian inscrutability —such as invisibility, silence, unreliability, flatness and withholding—to express Asian American life.
“Everyone Wants To Know” (Simon & Schuster) by Kelly Loy Gilbert. The Lo family sticks together, at least that’s what the young daughter has been told since they’ve been in the glare of the public eye as “reality show” personalities. So when the father announces he’s moving out of their California house to an apartment in Brooklyn, the daughter feels betrayed. And the betrayals continue as her best friend leaks a private conversation to a gossip site and tragedy strikes an older sister, this teenage girl finds herself in a dilemma. Should she still be the one to keep the family together or truly open her heart to a new friend who truly sees the real her?
“Weasels In The Attic” (New Directions) by Hiroko Oyamada as translated by David Boyd. Due out October 2022. From the acclaimed author of “The Hole” and “The Factory” comes a thrilling and mysterious novel that explores fertility, masculinity, and marriage in contemporary Japan In three interconnected scenes, the writer revisits the same set of characters at different junctures in their lives.
“Complicit” (Emily Bestler Books/Atria) by Winnie M. Li. A Hollywood has-been, Sarah Lai has left her dreams of filmmaking success by the wayside. But when a journalist reaches out to her to discuss her experience working with a celebrated film producer, Sarah can no longer keep silent As she recounts the industry’s dark and sordid secrets, however, she begins to realize she has a few sins of her own to confess.
Marya Khan And The Incredible Henna Party (Amulet) by Saadia Faruqi and illustrated by Ani Bushry. With Marya’s eighth birthday coming up, all she wants is a party as awesome as her rich neighbor. But how can she make it happen? Everything she does seems to end in disaster. Will she find a way to throw the best party ever?
“Almanac Of Useless Talents” (Clash) is a new book of poetry by Michael Chang. “Michael Chang’s poetry collections are praised for their biting wit and humor, for their critique of injustice, for their juxtaposition of highbrow and low, for their velocity, their leaps, their sense of scale, for their sweeping range of style and subject and tone. The praise is well-earned and accurately describes Chang’s newest book. Chang reminds us that the bawdy, the blunt, the quip are as much a part of poetry as the romantic, the eloquent, the aphoristic. His poems inspire us to critique what we love, not in spite of that love, but because of it.” – Blas Falconer
“The Blue Scarf” (RPKids) by Mohamed Danawi and illustrated by Ruaida Mannaa. Layla is gifted a blue scarf by her mother that she lovingly wears around her neck. But when the wind carries it away, Layla sails the seas to various world of different colors in an effort to find it. But no one has seen her scarf – where can it be?
“Why We Can’t Have Nice Things – Social Media’s Influence on Fashion, Ethics, and Property” (Duke) by Minh-Ha T. Pham. In this book, Pham examines the way social media users monitor the fashion market for the appearance of knockoff fashion, design theft, and plagiarism.
“A Bilingual Treasury of Chinese Folktales-Ten Traditional Stories in Chinese and English” (Tuttle) by Vivian Lin and Wang Peng and illustrated by Yang Xi. All cultures have stories telling you what life is all about. This collection tells you how to be a good person and have a good life. The lessons in this book are presented in a charming way, so children can discover them for themselves.
From the award-winning author of “Amina’s Voice” comes “Zara’s Rules for Finding Hidden Treasure” (Salaam Reads) by Hena Khan and illustrated by Wastana Haikal. When a new family moves in across the street, suddenly Zara who is queen of her neighborhood finds her reign threatened. To get everyone’s attention again, Zara decides she’s going to break a Guinness World Record. But when no one notices, Zara learns a lesson.
“1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows – A Memoir” (Crown) by Ai Weiwei. This dissident Chinese artist tells the remarkable history of China while also illuminating his artistic process and divulging the tragic story of his celebrated poet father and how the family suffered during the Cultural Revolution.
“I Am Minor” (Nomadic Press) by Ryan Nakano. “I Am Minor” is a simulacrum’s simulacra, a reflection on how one reflects and is reflected through the screen, community, and the state. This collection is the result of studying the moving image (film); the shadow against the wall of a cave where a guard determines how much light to let in, and how much to block out with the body. Let these poems be for all those who keep searching for themselves by staring up at the sun.
“Buddha And The Rose” (RP KIDS) by Mallika Chopra and illustrated by Neha Rawat. Buddha sat with a rose in his hand, still. Sujata the milkmaid beings him pudding to break his fast, she too gazes at the rose. What she saw and felt changes her life forever.
“In The Beautiful Country” (Quill Tree) by Jane Kuo. A young adult novel in verse about a Taiwanese family who move to America with hopes and dreams. But reality dashes hopes and brings doubt the family will last even one year. A moving novel about finding your way in the world and what it truly means for a place to become home.
“Holding On” (Atheneum Books for Young Readers) by Sophia N. Lee and illustrated by Isabel Roxas. There is always singing in Lola’s house. Her granddaughter tucks these sounds and Lola’s wisdom deep within her heart. And when Lola starts slipping into silence, she helps Lola hold on, piece by piece, with the joy and music that Lola taught her. The artwork is vibrant and colorful and moves the story along.
“Sunrise – Radiant Stories” (Astra House) by Erika Kobayashi as translated by Brian Bergstrom. A collection of interconnected stories in which the author examines the effects of nuclear power on generations of women
What’s The Rush? (Princeton Architectural Press) written and illustrated by Yiting Lee. In this reimagined picture book version of Aesop’s fable, children will learn the importance of friendship, tolerance and patience as they follow the adventures of Bunny and Turtle.
“The Love Match”(Salaam Reads) by Priyanka Taslim. This young adult novel is a rom-com about a Bangladeshi American teenager whose meddling mother arranges a match to secure their family’s financial security—just as she’s falling in love with someone else.
“One Wish – Fatima al-Fihri and the World’s Oldest University” (Harper) by M.O. Yuksel and illustrated by Miriam Quaraishi. This picture book tells the story of a woman, her dream and the importance of never giving up and how we all have the power to change the world for the better.
“Love From Mecca To Medina (Simon & Schuster) by S. K. Ali. The young couple Adam and Zayneb return in this romantic sequel to the young adult novel, “Love From A to Z”. Enduring a long-distance relationship, the couple is thrilled when fate brings them together on a religious pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. But the trip is nothing like what they expect as emotions and anxieties come to the surface.
“Buddhist Stories for Kids – Jataka Tales of Kindness, Friendship, and Forgiveness” (bala kids) by Laura Burges and illustrated by Sonali Zohra. Travel back in time to ancient India and hear these profound and playful tales, brought vividly to life ad reinterpreted for children today.
“Names and Rivers” (Copper Canyon) by Shuri Kido as translated by Tomoyuki Endo and Forrest Gander. Considered one of the most influential poets in Japan today, these poems draw influence from Japanese culture, geography, Buddhist teachings and modernist poets. This is a book made of crossings, questionings and mysteries as unanswered and open as the sky.
“Astrid & Apollo” is a new series of books about a Hmong American sister and brother as they engage in a variety of activities and along the way the stories educate readers about Hmong American culture. They are written by V.T. Bidania and illustrated by Evelt Yanait and published by Picture Window Books, a Capstone imprint. The titles published thus far inclue the following – “Astrid & Apollo And The Family Fun Fair Day”, ”Astrid & Apollo And The Awesome Dance Audition”, “Astrid & Apollo And The Super Staycation” and “Astrid & Apollo And The Ice Fishing Adventure.”
“Storybook ND” is a new series of slim hardcover fiction books from New Directions that aim to deliver the pleasure one felt as a child reading a marvelous book from cover to cover in just one afternoon. New in this series are a couple of stories by Japanese authors. “3 Streets” by Yoko Tawada as translated by Margaret Mitsutani introduces three ghost stories, each named after a street in Berlin. “Early Light” by Osamu Dazai offers three very different aspects of this fiction writer’s genius as translated by Donald Keene and Ralph McCarthy. The misadventures of a drinker and a family man in the terrible fire bombings of Tokyo at the end of WWII. Another tale looks at the symbol of Mt. Fuji as a cliché as the author finds it unable to escape its famous views and reputation. The final story follows the ascension of a drunkard’s wife as she transforms herself into a woman not to be defeated by anything life throws at her.
“It’s Diwali!” (Beach Lane) by Kabir Sehgal and Surishtha Sehgal and illustrated by Archana Sreenivasan. Kids can read along to the tune of the nursery rhyme “One, Two, Buckle My Shoe” and discover what makes this Indian festival so special.
“A Summer Day in the Company of Ghosts” (NYRB) by Wang Yin as translated by Andrea Lingenfelter with a foreword by Adonis. Wang Yin is recognized as a leading member of the post-Misty poets, a group inspired by the underground movement that resisted the artistic mores of 1970s China. This collection maps his 40-year career in its brushes with Romanticism, Surrealism, satire and Deep Image poetry.
“Journey of the Midnight Sun” (Orca) by Shazia Afzal and illustrated by Aliya Ghare. Inuvik, a small but growing Muslim community in the Canadian arctic was in need of new mosque. Funds were raised to build and ship the mosque but the harrowing journey wasn’t easy. Along the way, so many people helped.
“Innocence” (Cleveland State University Poetry Center) by Korean American poet Michael Joseph Walsh. Winner of the 2021 Lighthouse Poetry Series Competition. The series judge Shane McCrae said this of the book – “Complete as first books of poetry rarely are, integral as first books of poetry rarely are, “Innocence” reads as if it exists only to be; it pursues no end other than its own being which is the end of all successful works of art, whatever a particular work’s subject. “Innocence” is “that spoken thing/Only now created/That opens out into every room” which is to say, alive from beginning to end, a life.
“Dad, don’t Miss It! (MinEditions-Astra Books for Young Readers) written and illustrated by Qiaoqiao Li. A child and his father are off for a day in the countryside—but dad is distracted by his computer. Why can’t dad see what the child sees? An enchanting story about the power of unplugging from our devices.
“Berani” (Pajama Press) by Michelle Kadarusman. Malia is determined to save the rainforests and endangered orangutans of her Indonesian homeland. Ari is grateful for the chance to live with his uncle and go to school but his uncle’s caged orangutan’s living condition is breaking his heart. When Malia and Ari cross paths, their futures— and the orangutan’s—will forever be changed in this middle grade novel.
My Grand Mom (Amazon Crossing Kids), written and illustrated by Gee-eum Lee and translated by Sophie Bowman. A little Korean girl whose parents work a lot spends her days with her grandmother. Based on the author’s own relationship with her grandma, this book is a celebration of a most unique and precious guardian. The illustrations are a whimsical delight.
“Brown Is Beautiful” (Farrar Straus & Giroux) by Supriya Kelkar and illustrated by Noor Sofi. On a day hike with her grandparents, a young Indian American girl takes pictures of things in nature that are brown like her. An uplifting story of self-love and new beginnings.
“Abundance” (Graywolf) is a novel by Jakob Guanzon. A father and son on the edge of poverty lose their safety net and fall into the abyss of hopelessness that plagues the American landscape. What makes people poor and what kind of system keeps them mired in that condition.
byYQ is a small press created by children’s author Yobe Qiu to publish her picture books for children. Here are three of their titles. “Our Moon Festival” illustrated by Christina Nel Lopez looks at the way this holiday is celebrated in China, Vietnam and Japan including the use of puppets, poetry, lion dances and lanterns. ”Asian Adventures A – Z” as illustrated by Jade Le journeys around Asia highlighting traditions and cultures of Asia’s countries while also teaching little ones, the alphabet. “I Am An Amazing Asian Girl – A Positive Affirmation Book For Asian Girls” as illustrated by Jade Le follows an assertive Asian girl on a journey of positive affirmations as she embraces her culture and identity.
Step away from your daily life and enter the stillness of “Mindfulness Travel Japan” (Hardie Grant) by Steve Wide and Michelle Mackintosh. This book brings you 100 of the best travel experiences all over Japan.
“Glorious Boy” (Red Hen) by Aimee Liu. “Set in a penal colony on the remote Andaman Islands, this novel is the whirlwind story of vanishing cultures, Unbreakable codes, rebellion, occupation, and colonization, all swirling around the disappearance of a mute four-year-old boy on the eve of the Japanese occupation of Port Blair.” – Rahna Reiko Rizzuto.
“Model Machines – A History Of The Asian As Automaton” (Temple University Press) by Long T. Bui. “In this powerful and indispensable historiography, Long Bui puts to rest any lingering doubt about the pernicious pervasiveness of the model machine myth that has long cast Asians as technologized non-humans in American cultural and economic histories.” – Betty Huang
“Happy Stories, Mostly” (Feminist Press) by Norman Erikson Pasaribu as translated by Tiffany Tsao. Queer Indonesian writer Norman Erikson Pasaribu blends together speculative fiction and dark absurdism, drawing from Batak and Christian cultural elements. Longlisted for the International Booker Prize, this volume presents short stories that ask what it means to be almost happy—nearly to find joy, to sort of be accepted, but to never fully grasp one’s desire. Joy shimmers on the horizon, just out of reach.
“Dragon Noodles Party – A Story of Chinese Zodiac Animals” (Holiday House) by Ying Chang Compestine and illustrated by Paula Pang. This children’s picture book involves all the animals of the Chinese zodiac as they go on a journey one by one to prepare food for a party for one of their favorite friends.
“About Us – Young Photography in China” (Hirmer) by Eva-Maria Fahrner-Tutsek and Petra Giloy-Hirtz. What does photography tell us about the life experience of an individual facing a rapidly changing society? What pictorial language is a younger generation of artists in China creating in its search for self-understanding? This book of over 200 photographs from the 1990s to the present by forty artists gives us an inside glimpse and shows how it is experienced and lived by its young people.
“Direwood” (Page Street) by Catherine Yu. When older sister Fiona goes missing, sixteen-year-old Aja discovers a vampire is responsible. But to find her sister, she must follow this vampire into the woods. Shocking body horror and dangerous romance with a vampire co-mingle in this debut novel. A gothic tangle of a tale.
“The Age of Goodbyes” (Feminist Press) by Li Zi Shu as translated by YZ Chin. In 1969, in the wake of Malaysia’s deadliest race riots, a woman named Du Li An secures her place in society by marrying a gangster. In a parallel narrative, a critic known only as The Fourth Person explores the work of a writer also named Du Li An. And a third storyline is in the second person: “you” are reading a novel titled “The Age of Goodbyes”. Floundering in the wake of your mother’s death, you are trying to unpack the secrets surrounding your lineage. This novel is a profound exploration of what happens to personal memory when official accounts of history distort and render it taboo.
“The Curious Thing” (W. W. Norton) by Sandra Lim. “These are poems of passion and self-scrutiny and female rage, but Sandra Lim is not a poet of explosive feeling. The poems have a prose elegance; they are cool, detached, ruminative, with a kind of whistle-in-the-dark bravado. Here is a mind studying itself and its ambivalence, exact at every turn, and by the end, breathtaking.” –Nobel-Prize winning poet Louise Gluck.
PAON – Real Balinese Cooking” (Hardie Grant) by Tjok Maya Kerth Yasa and I Wayan Kresna Yasa. Direct from the traditional home kitchens of Bali, “PAON” is a cookbook of true Balinese food and recipes. Locals share more than 80 traditional dishes alongside essays and beautiful photography, capturing the life, culture and food from across the island.
“The Book of Goose” (Farrar Straus & Giroux) is a novel by Yiyun Li. As children in a war-ravaged, back water town, Fabienne and Agnes built a private world, invisible to everyone but themselves—–until Fabienne, the ruler of their little world, hatched a plan that would change everything, launching Agnes on an epic trajectory through fame, fortune, and terrible loss. When her sister dies, Fabienne embarks on an entirely different relationship with her life and fame.
“Unspoken” (Hirmer) by Miwa Ogasawara. The human between light and shade, closeness and distance. Ogasawara’s painting represents in all of their nuances. In her pictures she captures the brittle, shimmering present, the beauty and fragility of our existence.
Avatasha Rao’s “Latitude” (The American Poetry Review) was the 2021 winner of the APR/Honickman First Book Prize as selected by Ada Limon. It’s a book of poems that honor both the human animal and the timelessness of our earth in poem after poem.
“When I Was The Wind” (June Road Press) by Port Townsend-based poet Hannah Lee Jones. In her debut poetry collection, Jones brings readers on a mythic journey across a vast physical and metaphysical landscape. What emerges is a richly textured map of love and loss, a tapestry of hard-won truths both personal and universal. At turns mysterious, dreamlike, intimate, and illuminating, these poems explore what is wild and timeless in the human soul.
“Sophie Go’s Lonely Hearts Club” (Berkley) by Roselle Lim. When a disgraced matchmaker returns from Shanghai to her hometown of Toronto, the prospects seem bleak. That is until she meets a group of older Chinese men who never found love. They adopt her and shower her with support. This is a story rich with a love of food, family support and cultural identity.
“Ai Weiwei – In Search Of Humanity” (Hirmer) Edited by dieter Buchhart, Elsy Lahner and Klaus Albrecht Schroder. This book serves as the catalog for the most comprehensive retrospective for this Chinese artist to date by the Albetina Museum. The exhibition offers an impressive overview of the artist’s career spanning more than four decades and includes key works from all his creative phases. With short essays by various writers.
“A Bit of Earth” (Greenwillow)by Karuna Riazi. A reimagining of the classic “The Secret Garden” tells the story of a Pakistani girl bounced between relatives after her parent’s death and then shipped off to America where she feels lost until she discovers the garden, a place off limits yet where her self identity can bloom.
“Prescribee” (Nightboat) by Chia-Lun Chang. Reading this book is not dissimilar to the experience of coming across a recipe in a vintage American cookbook: it transforms the familiar ingredients of contemporary life into an uncanny, discomfiting concoction. Wielding English as a foreign language and medium, Chang redefines the history of Taiwan and captures the alienation of immigrant experience with a startlingly original voice. Flouting tired expectations of race, gender, nationality, and citizen status, “Prescribee” is as provocative as it is perceptive, as playful as it is sobering.
“This Place is Still Beautiful” (Balzer + Bray) by Xixi Tian is a story of two estranged sisters who could not be more unlike, forced together after a racially-motivated hate crime marks their family in small town Ohio. It explores racism, identity, the model minority myth, sisterhood and how hometowns are inextricably part of who we are even as we leave them.
“My Magical Castle” (Abrams Appleseed) written and illustrated by Yujin Shin. This board book for toodlers flies kids off to a magical castle with a dragon and his friends. They can push, pull and slide the images inside to bring their adventures to life.
“O.B.B.” (Nightboat Books) by Paolo Javier. Crafted through years-long collaborations O.B.B. aka The Original Brown Boy is a postcolonial techno dream pop comics poem. It is a book that can’t be pinned down with many identities; it is a comics poem and a manifesto on comics poetry; an experimental comic book sequel to a poem twenty years in the making; and an homage to the Mimeo Revolution, weird fiction, Kamishibai, the political cartoon, Pilipinx komiks history, and the poet bp/Nichol. Javier deconstructs a post-9/11 Pilipinx identity, amid the lasting fog of the Philippine American War, to compose a far-out comic book.
“Accomplice to Memory” (Kaya) by Q. M. Zhang. In this unusual book, the author tries to piece together the fractured mystery of her father’s exodus from China to the U.S. during the two decades of civil and world war leading up to the 1949 revolution. Part memoir, part novel, and part historical documentary, this hybrid text explores the silences and subterfuge of an immigrant parent, and the struggles of the second generation to understand the first. Zhang blurs the boundary between fiction and nonfiction, memory and imagination to tell the story of one woman working to understand and reimagine her family and her father.
“Little Red Riding Hood and the Dragon” (Abrams) by Ying Chang Compestine and illustrated by Joy Ang. The author re-invents the old folktale of a girl in a red cape gobbled up by a wolf and presumes to tell the “real” story. That of a little girl who lives with her mother near the Great Wall of China and practices kung fu. When she ventures into the woods to visit a sick grandmother she encouners a mighty dragon. With her wits and sword in hand, she defeats the monster. With action, humor and vibrant drawings, a classic fairy tale gets a new life.
“Poukahangatus” (Knopf) by Taye Tebble. Hilarious, intimate, moving and virtuosic, this young woman is one of the most exciting new voices in poetry today. She challenges a dazzling array of mythologies – Greek, Maori, feminist, Kiwi – peeling them apart, respinning them in modern terms. Along the way, Tibble scrutinizes perception and she as a Maori woman fits into trends, stereotypes, and popular culture.
“A Venom Dark And Sweet” (Feiwel & Friends) by Judy I. Lin. A great evil has come to the Kingdom of Daxi. The banished prince has returned. Mass poisonings have kept the people bound in fear and distrust. Ning, a young magician has escorted the princess into exile with her bodyguards. These four young women must go in search of allies to help oust the invaders and take back the throne. But an evil more ancient than the petty conflicts of men haunts. What can be done before it consumes the world?
“Virgil Kills: Stories” (Nightboat Books) by Ronaldo V. Wilson. Linked stories, alighting from a US, Black and Filipino imaginary through a central character, Virgil, and his accounts of race, sex, and desire. This book forms, manifesting a set of poetic investigations—revealing black and brown life, memory, dreams, the sea, the sex-act, the line. Virgil travels in theaters and lots, moves against class, whiteness, on stages, at lecterns, in studios and a luxury vehicle. Virgil records in the sensorium of cruising lovers, real love, family, T.V., and characters with names like “Butch,” “Stream,” “Clean”—his precise unfurling.
“Sunday Pancakes” (Dial) written and illustrated by Maya Tatsukawa. Geisel Award honoree Tatsukawa has created a heartwarming and nourishing story that celebrates friendship and the ultimate comfort food. And aspiring young chefs can also test out the pancake recipe found in the story at the end.
“Becoming Nisei – Japanese American Urban Lives in Prewar Tacoma” (UW Press) by Lisa M. Hoffman & Mary L. Hanneman. Based on more than forty interviews, these informants share stories of growing up in Japanese American Tacoma before the incarceration. Recording these early twentieth-century lives counteracts the structural forgetting and erasure of prewar histories in both Tacoma and many other urban settings after WW II.
“Theo Tan And The Fox Spirit” (Feiwel & Friends) by Jesse Q. Sutanto. From the author of the adult bestseller, “Dial A For Aunties” comes her first middle grade fantasy. Theo Tan doesn’t want a spirit companion – he just wants to be a normal American kid. But when his older brother dies, he ends up inheriting his fox spirit, Kai. Though both are not happy with this arrangement, they must set aside differences to honor the brother’s last wishes or the mystery he died for will remain unsolved forever.
“Saving Sorya-Chang And The Sun Bear” (Dial Graphic) by Trang Nguyen & Jeff Zdung. A poignant middle grade graphic novel adventure based on a true story, about a young conservationist who overcomes the odds to save a sun bear.
“Ramen For Everyone” (Atheneum Books for Young Readers) by Patricia Tanumihardja and illustrated by Shiho Pate. Hiro’s dream is to make the perfect ramen like his dad who he’s watched over the years. But when he gets started, things go awry. With his father’s advice, he’s able to find a way to make ramen in his own creative way. A picture book sure to make you hungry.
“Trinity Trinity Trinity” (Astra House) by Erika Kobayashi as translated by Brian Bergstrom. Nine years after the f*ckushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster, Japan is preparing for the 2020 Olympics. An unnamed narrator wakes up in a cold, sterile room, unable to recall her past.
“The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern” (Melville House) by Rita Zoey Chin. Raised as “the youngest and very best fortune teller in the world” by her mother, Leah Fern is devastated when that very same mother disappears from her life. Fifteen years later and no sight of her mom, Leah decides to end her life only to be interrupted by a knock on the door and a message that takes her on a journey that will be a revelation.
“The Dawn of Yangchen – Chronicles of the Avatar” (Amulet) by F. G. Yee. Yangchen has not yet earned the respect felt for her predecessor, and the loss of her sister has left her with few true allies. But in Bin-Er – a city run by corrupt shang merchants seeking to extract themselves from the Earth King’s influence – a chance encounter with an informant named Kavik leads to a wary partnership. This propulsive third installment in the Chronicles of the Avatar series illuminates our heroine’s journey from uncertain, young woman to revered leader.
“Yuna’s Cardboard Castles” (Beaming Books) by Marie Tang and illustrated by Jieting Chen. Yuna and her family have moved from Japan to the US and she doesn’t speak English yet. At first, her attempts to catch the attention of the neighborhood kids get lost in translation, but when she shows that she can do something very special with paper, a whole new world unfolds. In the back of the book, there is information about the origin of origami and how kids can fold their own paper boat.
“The Backstreets – A Novel From Xinjiang” (Columbia University Press) by Perhat Tursun as translated by Darren Byler and anonymous. “The publication of this book, together with Byler’s illuminating introduction, is a landmark event in English-language world literature. The narration of the life of a Uyghur office worker in Urumchi is unforgettable and mind-blowing. The style, mood and scope are evocative of Camus while still feeling utterly distinctive and unprecedented. A triumph.”- Elif Batuman. This novel is by a contemporary Uyghur author who was disappeared by the Chinese State.
“This Time it’s Real” (Scholastic) by Ann Liang. Teenage girl Eliza writes an essay about meeting the love of her life which makes her popular at the international school in Beijing which she’s attending. Trouble is, it’s all made up. Desperate to keep it a secret, she makes a deal with a fellow student to pose as her boyfriend. But what happens when this “fake” relationship starts feeling too real?
“Three Assassins” (Overlook) by Kotaro Isaka is the follow up to the international bestselling author of “Bullet Train” (now a Hollywood movie). Translated from the Japanese by Sam Malissa, the story pits an ordinary man against a network of quirky and effective assassins. To get justice for his wife’s murder, this man must take on each of the three assassins while struggling to maintain his moral center.
“Penguin and Penelope”(Bloomsbury) by Salina Yoon. This Geisel Honor-winning author/illustrator reintroduces her beloved character Penguin who helps guide a lost baby elephant back to her herd. A lovely tale about the bonds of friendship that resonate long after separation with simple yet evocative illustrations in bright colors.
“Diwali in My New Home” (Beaming Books) by Shachi Kaushik and illustrated by Aishwarya Tandon. A poignant story about an Indian girl’s experience of celebrating Diwali for the first time since coming to the US. What will be the reception when she introduces this holiday to her neighbors in a new place with those unfamiliar with this traditional holiday?
“A Catalog of Such Stuff as Dreams Are Made On” (Columbia) by Dung Kai-Cheung as translated by Bonnie S. McDougall and Anders Hansson. “These half-allegorical sketches by a uniquely gifted Hong Kong writer bring to us a nostalgic mosaic of the sights and sounds of a city whose cosmopolitan splendor is fast fading.” – Leo Ou-Fan Lee
“Fuccboi” (Little Brown), a novel by Sean Thor Conroe. It’s late 2017, a year after Trump’s election and our main character is broke, bitter and washed up as a failure at everything he’s attempted in life. As he wonders how sustainable is this mode of failure, the reader gets a look at an unvarnished, playful and searching examination of what it means to be a man in today’s world.
“If You Could See The Sun” (Inkyard) is a young adult novel by Ann Liang. In this genre-bending debut, a Chinese American girl monetizes her strange new invisibility powers by discovering and selling her wealthy classmates’ most scandalous secrets. But as the tasks escalate from petty scandals to actual crimes, she must decide if it’s worth losing her conscience for –or even her life.
“The Boy Who Met a Whale”(Peachtree) by Nizrana Farook. The author of “The Girl Who Stole an Elephant” returns with a tale of a Sri Lankan fisherboy who gets swept up in a thrilling seafaring adventure, complete with a kidnapping, missing treasure, and a huge blue whale. Set against the vibrant landscape of Sri Lanka, this delightful caper will thrill young fans of adventure with empathetic heroes, missing treasure, and a great beast lurking beneath the waters.
“Never Show a T. Rex a Book” (Kane Miller) by Rashmi Sirdeshpande and illustrated by Diane Ewen. A laugh-out-loud story for kids that’s brimming with imagination, mayhem, and a celebration of the power of books.
“Navigating Chamoru Poetry – Indigeneity, Aestheties, and Declonization” (University of Arizona Press) by Craig Santos Perez. Poet and scholar Perez looks at Indigenous CHamoru poetry from the Pacific Island of Guahan (Guam) and brings critical attention to a diverse and intergenerational collection of Chamoru poetry and scholarship.
“Boobies” (Groundwood) written and illustrated by Nancy Vo. This Canadian writer/artist approaches the theme of breasts in a refreshing humorous way taking us on a journey from mammals to humans to mountains and the differences and similarities that lie within.
“While I was Away”(Quill Tree) by Waka T. Brown is a young adult non-fiction book. When Waka’s mother suspects her twelve-year old daughter can’t understand basic Japanese, she makes a drastic decision to ship Waka from her rural Kansas home to Tokyo to live with her strict grandmother and reconnect with the culture and master the language. If she’s always been the “smart Japanese girl” in American but is now the “dumb foreigner in Japan, where is home…and who will Waka be when she finds it?
“Lost in the Long March” (Overlook) by Michael X. Wang. This gripping debut novel is set against the backdrop of Mao’s Long March and its aftermath. It contrasts the intimate with the political, revealing how the history of a country is always the story of its people, even though their stories can be the first to be lost.
“Blanket” (Groundwood) by Ruth Ohi. This is the author’s first wordless picture book that tells the heartfelt, evocative story about those times when you want to hide away from the world — and how much it can mean to have a friend who will stay by your side and keep you company. She does all this with the characters of a sad cat and her friend, the dog.
“Fairest” (Penguin) by Meredith Talusan. This book tells the story of a precocious boy with albinism raised in a rural Philippine village who would grow up to become a woman in America. Perceived as white in the U.S., Talusan would go on to Harvard but required a navigation through complex spheres of race, class and sexuality until she found her own place within the gay community.
“Vanished” (University of Nebraska Press) – Stories by Karin Lin Greenberg. Winner of the RAZ/Schumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction, this book tells the story of women and girls in upstate New York who are often overlooked or unseen by those around them. Humorous and empathetic, the collection exposes the adversity in each character’s life, each deals with something or someone who has vanished – a person close to her, a friendship, a relationship – as she seeks to make sense of the world around her in the wake of that loss.
“Golden Age” (Astra House) is a novel by the late Wang Xiaobo as translated by Yan Yan. When a rumor surfaces that a man is having an affair with a woman in a Chinese village, a 21 year-old ox herder is shamed by local authorities and forced to write a confession for his crimes. Instead, he takes it upon himself to write a modernist literary tract. A leading icon of his generation, Xiabo’s cerebral and sarcastic narrative is a reflection on the failures of individuals and the enormous political, social and personal changes that traumatized 20th century China.
“People From Bloomington” (Penguin Classics) by Budi Darma. Translated by Tiffany Bao. This is the first English translation of a short story collection about Americans in Mid-west America by one of Indonesia’s most beloved writers. Set in Bloomington where the author lived as a grad student in the 1970s. In an eerie, alienating, yet comic and profoundly sympathetic portrait, the author paints a picture of the cruelty of life and the difficulties that people face in relations to one another.
“And Those Ashen Heaps That Cantilivered Vase of Moonlight” (Wave) by Lynn Xu. This unique book-length poem is part protest against reality, part metaphysical reckoning, part international for the world-historical surrealist insurgency and part arte povera for the wretched of the earth.
“Complicit” (Atria) is a novel by Winnie M. Li. It tells the story of a young but eager daughter of Chinese immigrants who takes a lowly but coveted position at a New York film production company. Gradually she works her way up the ladder only to see her dream crumble to dust. Ten years pass and when a reporter appears, investigating the director she once worked for before quitting the business – she must decide what to do. Does she tell the world her story? Does she want revenge? And can she face her own involvement in her downfall?
“Beating Heart Baby” (Flatiron) by Lio Min is a tender friends-to-enemies-to lovers story with AAPI leads, celebrates first love, second chances, indie rock and transitions in life of many kinds. An anime-influenced, young adult, queer coming-of-age love story not without complications and challenges.
“House of Sticks”(Scribner),a memoir by Ly Tran. The author weaves together her family’s immigration experience with her own fraught and courageous coming-of-age to form a portrait of one girl’s struggle to reckon with her heritage and forge her own singular path.
“Solo Dance” (World Editions) by Li Kotomi is an important queer Chinese-Japanese novelist who as a millennial paints a picture of growing up in today’s Japan and Taiwan and his efforts to find a place for himself in a this shifting, confusing landscape. Translated by Arthur Reiji Morris.
“A Mermaid Girl” (Viking) by Sana Rafi and illustrated by Olivia Aserr. When a Muslim girl enters the water at a community pool in her yellow birkini, she is met with skepticism. But when her mother instills confidence in the tradition of her family, she begins to shine.
“Chinatown” (New Directions) by Thuan. An abandoned package is discovered in the Paris Metro: the subway workers suspect it’s a terrorist bomb. A Vietnamese woman sitting nearby with her son, begins to reflect on her life, from her constrained childhood in Communist Hanoi, to a long period of study in Leningrad and finally to the Parisian suburbs where she now teaches English. Through everything runs her passion for Thuy, the father of her son, a writer who lives in Saigon’s Chinatown, and who, with the shadow of the China-Vietnam border war falling darkly between the, she has not seen for eleven years.
“Tomorrow In Shanghai” (Blair) by May-Lee Chai is a book of short stories that explores multicultural complexities through the lenses of class, wealth, age, gender, and sexuality—always tackling the nuanced, knotty, and intricate exchanges of interpersonal and institutional power. Essential reading for an increasingly globalized world.
“Bloom and other poems”(New Directions) by Xi Chuan as translated from the Chinese by Lucas Klein. This poet delves into the incongruities of daily existence—its contradictions and echoes of ancient history—with sensuous exaltations and humorous observation. Melding lyrical beauty with philosophical intensity, the collection ends with a conversation between the poet and the writer Xu Zhiyuan.
“I Guess I Live Here Now” (Viking) by Claire Ahn. When Melody and her mother are suddenly forced to leave New York to join her father in Seoul, she is resentful and homesick. But she adjusts into her fashionable Korean lifestyle until cracks begin to appear on its glittering surface. The story is a revealing exposure of who and what “home” really is.
“Kundo Wakes Up” (Tordotcom) by Saad Z. Hossain. “Cyberpunk, high fantasy, climate catastrophe, and at its heat, a compelling story about broken people finding each other and a way to become whole again.” –Samit Basu. A companion to the Ignite And Lucus Award-nominated novella “The Gurkha And The Lord Of Tuesday”.
“Sewing Love – Handmade Clothes for Any Body” (Sasquatch) by Sanae Ishida, author of “Sewing Happiness”. Learning to create and customize your own patterns empowers you to make exactly the kinds of clothes you want, and it solves the fit issues of ready-to-wear clothing (and even commercial patterns) designed to fit one “ideal” body type. Take a journey to loving the body you have, as you learn to sew beautiful, simple handmade clothes.
“UNNIE” by Yun-Yun is inspired by a true tragedy. Yun-Young’s sister who was a secondary school teacher and was one of those who go missing during the sinking of the Sewol ferry in South Korea in 2014. Yun-young and the family await word of her rescue or that her body has been found. Yet no news comes as the days, months and years go by. Yun-Young’s sorrow feels poisoned. She can’t move on with her life without understanding her sister’s life. Thus begins a journey to discover who her sister really was.
“Zachary Ying And The Dragon Emperor” (McElderry Books) by xiran Jay Zhao.Zachary Ying had never had many opportunities to learn about his Chinese heritage. His single mom was busy enough making sure they got by, and his schools never taught anything except Western history and myths. So Zack is woefully unprepared when he discovers he was born to host the spirit of the First Emperor of Chin for a vital mission. To save the mortal realm, a young hero must journey into a world where myth and history collide.
“COSPLAY – The Fictional Mode of Existence” (Minnesota) by Frenchy Lunning. Flourishing far beyond its Japanese roots, cosplay has become an international phenomenon with fervid fans who gather at enormous, worldwide conventions annually. Lunning offers an intimate, sensational tour through cosplay’s past and present, as well as its global lure.
“Bronze Drum – A Novel Of Sisters And War” (Grand Central) by Phong Nguyen. This is a fictionalized account of the true story of the Trung sisters, shared in Vietnam through generations for thousands of years. A tale of women warriors who rise up against the oppressive rule of the Han Chinese, ushering in a new period of freedom and independence.
“TSUCHI: Earthy Materials In Contemporary Japanese Art” (University of Minnesota Press) by Bert Winther-Tamaki. This book is an examination of Japanese contemporary art through the lens of ecocriticism and environmental history. Collectively referred to by the word “tsuchi”, earthy materials such as soil and clay are prolific in Japanese contemporary art. Highlighting works of photography, ceramics, and installation art, the author explores the many aesthetic manifestations of “tsuchi” and their connection to the country’s turbulent environmental history, investigating how Japanese artists have continually sought a passionate and redemptive engagement with the earth.
“Fierce And Fearless –Patsy Takemoto Mink, First Woman of Congress”(NYU Press) by Gwendolyn Mink. “This book chronicles Mink’s transformative leadership as she fought for ethnic, racial, gender, and environmental justice-and an end to war – even as she encountered systemic discrimination, physical and psychological abuse, and betrayal by her party. This gripping narrative illuminates the extraordinary policy accomplishments and the astounding personal costs of a principled and path breaking life in U.S. politics.” Excerpted from a quote from author Mary Hawkesworth.
“Taste Tibet – Family Recipes from the Himalayas” (Interlink Publishing) by Jule Kleeman & Yeshi Jampa. Nourishing, simple, seasonal food that heals as well as fuels might be popular today but it has been traditional in Tibet for over 8,000 years. This book offers over 80 recipes from the Tibetan Plateau, written for today’s home cook. Alongside the recipes, stories are interwoven of a Tibetan childhood in Tibet.
“Dream of the Divided Field” (One World) by Yanyi. “Here is a book of the body, a book like no other: tender and eloquent, a singing across borders, across silences. This is a book to read when we wake in the middle of the night and need a voice that is filled with longing, triuth, and the delight of being, despite all the painful odes” – excerpted from a quote by Ilya Kaminsky.
“Activities Of Daily Living” (Norton) is a novel by Lisa Hsiao Chen. Built around the performance art of Tehching Hsieh and the act of witnessing the end of a father’s life, our narrator struggles with issues of time, death, illness and the making of art and its symbiotic relationship to everyday life.
“Self-Portrait With Ghost” (Mariner) by Meng Jin (publication date of July 5, 2022) is a new book of short stories by the author of “Little Gods”. Written during the turbulent years of the Trump administration and the beginning of the pandemic, this book explores intimacy and isolation, coming-of-age and coming to terms with the repercussions of past mistakes, fraying relationships, and surprising moments of connection. The stories move between San Francisco and China, and from unsparing realism to genre-bending delight, this collection considers what it means to live in an age of heightened self-consciousness, with seemingly endless access to knowledge, but to have little actual power.
“The Noh Family” (Kokila) by Grace K. Shim. A Korean American teenage girl in Tilsa, Oklahoma is obsessed with K-dramas but she gets a real shock when she learns she’s related to an extended family on her deceased father’s side. When an invitation is extended, she is exposed to this family’s luxurious life-style. While the grandmother is welcoming, the rest of the family gives her the cold shoulder. What deep, dark secrets are hiding in this family’s closet?
“Japan’s Best Friend – Dog Culture In The Land Of The Rising Sun” (Prestel) by Manami Okazaki. For thousands of years, dogs have played a crucial role in Japanese society. This profusely color illustrated book looks at the country’s love affair with canines, exploring how they are represented through local traditions, as well as the extraordinary lengths to which they are exalted within pop culture.
“Only the Cat knows” (Red Hen Press) is a novella by Ruyan Meng. This harrowing and extraordinary story, based on a true event, is part of a series of tales illuminating the microcosm of all humanity contained in a typical Chinese “worker village” in the 70s. Here, an exploited young factory worker has nothing to live for beyond a frail chance of a pay raise. When it never happens, he feels trapped between his family and official greed, indifference, and corruption.
“The Interrogation Rooms Of The Korean War – The Untold History” (Princeton) by Monica Kim. “This is a deeply researched and insightful book. Drawing on a parade of fascinating characters, surprising scenes, and recently declassified material. Kim casts a fresh, innovativ1e light on the Korean War and shows how the ideological struggle in prisoner-of-war camps and their interrogation rooms became the final front line of a pivotal American conflict.” – Charles J. Hanley, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.
“Scatterted All Over The Earth” (New Directions) by Yoko Tawada as translated by Margaret Mitsutani. In this novel, the world’s climate disaster and its attendant refugee crisis are viewed through the loving twin lenses of friendship and linguistic ingenuity. In the not-too-distant future, Japan as a country has vanished. Hiroko, a former citizen and climate refugee teaches immigrant children in Denmark. As she searches for anyone who an still speak her native tongue, she makes new friends through her travels.
“Troubling the Water – A Dying Lake and a Vanishing World in Cambodia” (Potomac Books – University of Nebraska Press) by Abby Seiff. A eulogy to Cambodia’s once magnificent Tonle Sap Lake and the water culture of Cambodia and how it was destroyed by global warming, a dam and the greed of people.
“Love Decoded” (Razobill) by Jennifer Yen. When the niece of a professional matchmaker gets it in her head to create a fun-friend-making app online, it goes viral. But when this success turns into a major scandal and threatens her relationship with her best friends, this teenage girl is put in a dilemma only she can solve, but can she really?
“Winter Love” (McNally Editions) by Han Suyin. This short novel by the author of “Love is a Many Splendored Thing” recalls a love affair between two women at the end of WWII in war-torn London.
“The Last Ryu” (Levine Querido) by Emi Watanabe Cohen. Kohei has never seen a big dragon in real life like his grandpa says he has. But when his grandfather falls seriously ill, Kohei goes off on a journey to find this dragon with the help of friends.
“Tokyo Dreaming” (Flatiron) by Emiko Jean is the sequel to “Tokyo Ever After” in which a common Japanese American family learn their connection to Japanese royalty and a teenage girl becomes a princess. But just as her parents are about to be married, the Imperial Household questions their pedigree. What can she do if playing the perfect princess means sacrificing her own path and the failure to follow her own heart.
“Fish Swimming In Dappled Sunlight” (Bitter Lemon) by Riku Onda as translated by Alison Watts. Set in Tokyo over the course of one night, a couple meets for one last time before breaking up. Their relationship broken down by the death of their guide on a mountain trek, each believes the other to be a murderer.
“Peasprout Chen – Battle of Champions” (Henry Holt) by Henry Lien. Now in her second year at Pearl Famous Academy of Skate and Sword, Peasprout Chen tries to reclaim her place as champion of wu liu, the deadly and beautiful sport of martial arts figure skating. But Peasprout faces a surprising threat. As Peasprout guides her mission to save a kingdom, she must learn what it truly means to be a leader.
“Vulgar Beauty – Acting Chinese in the Global Sensorium” (Duke) by Mila Zuo. In this book, Zuo offers a new theorization of cinematic feminine beauty by showing how mediated encounters with Chinese film and popular culture start to produce a feeling of Chineseness.
“Disorientation” (Penguin Press) by Elaine Hsieh Chou tells the unforgettable story of a Chinese American grad student trying to finish a dissertation on a late canonical Chinese poet and be done with the cultural thing. A curious note in the archives leads to an explosive discovery that sets off a rollercoaster of mishaps and mis-adventures. A blistering send-up of privilege and power in America.
“All About Vietnam – Projects & Activities for kids” (Tuttle) by Phuoc Thi Minh Tran as illustrated by Dong Nguyen & Hop Thi Nguyen, In this lavishly detailed picture book, children will get an inside look at Vietnam’s vibrant culture, while learning through fun, hands-on games, songs, and activities. This multicultural children’s book is a great fit for story time at home or in a classroom.
“Climate Lyricism” (Duke) by Min Hyoung Song looks at how climate change affects the work of American authors as varied as Frank O’Hara, Tonny Pico, Sholmaz Sharif, Kazuo Ishigoro and others. This is a powerfully argued case for literature and poetry as a way of cultivating sustained attention to climate change in this tumultuous time.
“Birds of Paradise Lost” (Red Hen Press) by Andrew Lam is a collection of short stories that looks at what happened to the “Boat People” who escaped after the fall of Saigon.
“My Mechanical Romance” (Holiday House) by Alexene Farol Follmuth. When Bel accidentally reveals her talent for engineering, she finds herself a loner in her school’s legendary robotics club. Fortunately, Mateo who is captain of the club recognizes Bel as a potential asset. As competition heats up for national competition, the two form a closer relationship. This YA novel explores the challenges girls of color face in STEM and the vulnerability of first love with wit and honesty.
“Love Decoded” (Razorbill) by Jennifer Yen. A young adult novel about a teenage girl creates a friend-making app to earn a shot to represent her school and the chance at a prestigious tech internship. Trouble is, the app becomes a major scandal and ends up hurting her friends. How can she salvage her friendships?
“When I’m Gone, Look For Me In The East” (Pantheon) by Quan Barry. From the acclaimed author of “We Ride Upon Sticks” comes her new novel that moves across a windswept Mongolia, as estranged twin brothers make a journey of duty, conflict, and renewed understanding. Are our lives our own, or do we belong to something larger? This novel is an examination of our individual struggle to retain our convictions and discover meaning in a fast-changing world, as well as a meditation on accepting simply what is.
“Peach Blossom Spring” (Little, Brown) by Melissa Fu. It is 1938 in China, and Meilin, a young wife, has a bright future. But when the Japanese army approaches, Meilin and her four-year old son, Renshu are forced to flee their home. Years later, Renshu has settled in America as Henry Dao. Though his daughter, Lily, is desperate to understand her heritage, he refuses to talk about his childhood. Spanning continents and generations, this book is a look at the history of China, told through the journey of one family.
“CURB” (Nightboat) by Divya Victor won the 2022 Pen Open Book Award. These poems document how immigrants and Americans navigate the liminal sites of everyday living undergirded by violence. It bears witness to immigrant survival, familial bonds, and interracial parenting within the context of nationalist and white-supremicist violence against South Asians.
“Set On You” (Berkley) by Amy Lea is a romance novel that follows the life of a fitness instructor who after a recent break-up takes solace in the gym, her place of power and positivity. That calm turns competitive when a firefighter enters the gym and the two begin to spar.
“Red Thread Of Fate” (Berkley) by Lyn Liao Butler is a story of loss and recovery and a powerful message about the ties of family. After the tragic death of her husband and cousin on the eve of their adoption of a son from China, things get complicated. Tam Kwan finds herself a widow and sudden mother. She is named the guardian of the cousin’s five- year-old daughter without her knowledge. Now, Tam must decide if she will complete the adoption on her own and bring home the son waiting for her in a Chinese orphanage.
“Sunday Funday in Koreatown” (Holiday House) written and illustrated by Aram Kim. Yoomi has big plans for her day – make kimbap for breakfast, wear her favorite shirt, get her favorite books from the library and visit Grandma with her dad. But nothing goes right. This charming picture book shows how even when things don’t turn out the way you want to, the day can be rewarding. This is a story of resilience, family, and Korean culture.
“Search History” (Coffee House Press) is a novel by Eugene Lim. Frank is dead—or is he? While eavesdropping on two women discussing a dog-sitting gig over lunch, a bereft friend comes to a shocking realization: Frank has been reincarnated as a dog! This epiphany launches a series of adventures—interlaced with digressions about AI-generated fiction, virtual reality, Asian American identity in the arts, and lost parents—as an unlikely cast of accomplices and enemies pursues the mysterious canine.
“A Magic Steeped In Poison” (Feiwei & Friends) by Judy I. Lin. When Ning realizes it was she who unknowingly brewed the poison tea that killed her mother and now threatens to take away her sister too, she is beside herself. But she takes on the challenge to find the kingdom’s true masters of the magical art of tea-making for the princess will grant a favor to the winner. A favor she hopes will save her sister.
“Aerial Concave Without Cloud” (Nightboat) by Sueyeun Juliette Lee. This is a collection steeped in the bluest apocalypse light of solar collapse and the pale, ghostly light of personal devastation.nr Lee channels and interprets the language of starlight through her body into poetic form.
“Hana Hsu And The Ghost Crab Nation” (Razorbill) by Sylvia Liu. Desperate to figure out what’s going on, Hana and her friends find themselves spying on one of the most powerful corporations in the country – and the answers about the mystery could be closer to home than Hana’s willing to accept. Will she be able to save her friends – and herself – from a conspiracy that threatens everything she knows?
“Cadenzas” (Redbat Books) by Alex Kuo. This is a unique, double-sided work of fiction that narrates a conversation between music and languge, with walkins by Dorothy Parker, Dante, Edith Sitwell, J.S. Bach, Qiu Jin, Dmitri Shostakovich and June Jordan. It is Alex Kuo’s accumulation of more than eighty years of living, listening, and writing on several continents and breathing in the cadences of several languages, including three Chinese dialects.
“Loveboat Reunion” (Harper Teen) by Abigail Hing Wen. A couple teenagers emerge from a tumultuous past in which hearts were broken and revenge was plotted but all is forgiven as they become friends Determined to forge a future, Sophia has college plans and Xavier plays the waiting game, hoping to dodge his overbearing father long enough to collect his trust fund when he turns eighteen. But obstacles are in their way, can they succeed together or are they destined to combust? Find out in this young adult romance novel.
“Back To Japan – The Life and Art of Master Kimono Painter, Kunihiko Moriguchi” (Other Press) by Marc Pettijean and translated from the French by Adriana Hunter. This book describes the life and art of a master Kimono painter and Living National Treasure whose influences ranged from the Paris art scene of the1960s to the Japanese world of tradition where he began to contemporize the craft of yuzen (resist dyeing) through his innovative use of abstraction in patterns.
“Maizy Chen’s Last Chance” (Random House) by Lisa Yee. A Chinese American teenage girl finds herself in a small all-white town where her family’s Chinese restaurant has been around for years. But something’s not right. A family treasure is missing and someone has left a racist note. This book is a tribute to Chinese Americans and to immigrant families, and an unforgettable celebration of love, belonging and asking hard questions.
“The Village Of Eight Graves” (Pushkin Vertigo) by Seishi Yokomizo as translated by Bryan Karenyk. A mountain village called “Eight Graves” takes its name from a centuries-old massacre. When a young man arrives from the city to claim a mysterious inheritance and death follows in his wake, the villagers suspicions fall upon the newcomer. The young man must rely on the help of detective Kosuke Kindaichi to uncover the murderer and save his own reputation before the villagers take justice into their own hands.
“Brother’s Keeper” (Holiday House) by Julie Lee. Its 1950 in North Korea and everything is restricted. A family prepares to flee but war breaks out. Only the twelve year old daughter and her mother’s eight-year old son can make it out to escape to the South. They face insurmountable obstacles as they begin this journey.
“The Dreamweavers” (Holiday House) by G. Z. Schmidt. As Mid-Autumn Festival approaches, 12 year olds Mei and Yun Wu are excited as the Emperor of China’s son comes to their village to sample their grandfather’s incredible moon cakes. But when disaster strikes that night, these kids are left to their own devices on how to rescue their grandfather and village from a terrible fate. A middle-age novel for youngsters.
“The Wishing Tree” (Harper) by Meika Hashimoto and illustrated by Xindi Yan. This picture book tries to depict the spirit of giving and the spirit of xmas in a young child and how it lights up a whole town.
“The Grandmaster’s Daughter” (Green Willow) by Dan-ah Kim. In a small quiet village sits a martial arts school where the daughter of the grandmaster must teach as well as learn from every daily task. Colorful illustrations enhance this picture book.
“Love and Reparation – A Theatrical Response To The Section 377 Litigation In India” (Seagull Books) by Danish Sheikh. On 6 September 2018, a decades-long battle to decriminalize queer intimacy in India came to an end. The Supreme Court of India ruled that Section 377, the colonial anti-sodomy law, violated the country’s constitution. ‘LGBT persons,’ the Court said, ‘deserve to live a life unshackled from the shadow of being “unapprehended felons”.’ But how definitive was this end? The playwright navigates these questions with a deft interweaving of the legal, the personal, and the poetic in these two plays.
“It All Comes Back To You” (Quill Tree) by Farah Naz Rishi. For fans of “Pride & Prejudice” comes an enemies-to-lovers rom com about first love and second chances by this Pakistani American YA novelist.
“Rouge Street – Three Novellas” (Metropolitan Books) by Shuang Xuetao and translated by Jeremy Tiang. With an introductionby Chinese Canadian novelist Madeleine Thien. An inventor dreams of escaping his drab surroundings in a flying machine. A criminal, trapped beneath a frozen lake, fights a giant fish. A strange girl pledges to ignite a field of sorghum stalks. These are the characters that populate the world of this writer who evokes the voice of people from China’s frigid northeast in Shenyang, China. A gritty region once an industrial hub but now weighed down by unemployment, poverty, alchoholism, domestic violence, divorce and suicide.
“Word Travelers And The Taj Mahal Mystery” (Sourcebooks) by Raj Haldar and illustrated by Neha Rawat. Best friends Eddies and MJ are going to play outside, create an obstacle course for MJ’s newts, watch their favorite movies and then travel to India to solve a mystery and save akingdom.
“Touring The Land of The Dead” (Europa Editons) by Maki Kashimada as translated by Haydin Trowell. This book consists of two novellas that concern memory, loss and love. The title story invokes a woman who takes her chronically ill husband to a spa, the site of a former luxury hotel that her grandfather had taken her mother to when she was small. “Ninety-Nine Kisses” portrays the lives of four unmarried sisters in a close-knit neighborhood of Tokyo. Inspired by Tanizaki’s “The Makioka Sisters”.
“Longing and Other Stories” (Columbia University Press) by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki. Tanizaki is one of the most eminent Japanese writers of the twentieth century and known for his investigations of family dynamics, eroticism, and cultural identity. He is acclaimed for postwar novels such as “The Makioka Sisters” and “The Key”. This book presents three early stories of family life from the first decade of the author’s career. Translated by Anthony H. Chambers and Paul McCarthy.
“Winter Phoenix – Testimonies In Verse” (Deep Vellum) by Sophia Terazawa. A book of testimonies in verse, this book is a collection of poems written loosely after the form of an international war crimes tribunal. The poet, daughter of a Vietnamese refugee, navigates the epigenetics of trauma passed down, and across, the archives of war, dislocation and witness, as she repeatedly asks, “Why did you just stand there and say nothing?”
“The One Thing You’d Save” (Clarion) by Linda Sue Park and illustrated by Robert Sae-Heng. In this book, a Newbery medalist poses a provocative question about what matters most. Students talk, argue and stand by their choices as they discover unexpected facets of one another—and of themselves. With insight and humor, Park captures the voices of an inclusive classroom in verse inspired by the Korean poetry form sijo.
“Murakami T – The T-Shirts I Love” (Knopf) by Haruki Murakami. Photographs of Murakami’s T-shirt collection are paired with short, frank essays that include his musings on the joy of drinking Guinness in local Irish pubs, the pleasure of eating a burger upon arrival in the United States and Hawaiian surf culture in the 1980s.
In “Gamma Draconis” (Titan Comics), acclaimed artist Eldo Yoshimizu teams up with writer Benoist Simmat to create a dazzling crime tale of a Japanese heroine who takes on a sinister crime organization.
The Gleaner Song – Selected Poems” (Deep Vellum) by Song Lin as translated by Dong Li. Song Lin is one of China’s most innovative poets. When the Tianamen protest exploded in Beijing, Song led student demonstrations in Shanghai for which he was imprisoned for almost a year. Leaving China, this selection of poems spans four decades of exploration with a focus on poems written in France, Singapore and Argentina and more recently, his return to China.
“Leilong the Library Bus” (Gecko Press) by Julia Liu and illustrated by Bei Lynn. This award-winning book from Taiwan translated by Helen Wang tells the charming tale of a dinosaur who loves books and story time. Unfortunately his huge size causes problems when he tries to enter the library with the kids. How the problem is solved and how the dinosaur becomes an ambassador of library books is cleverly and humorously resolved in this picture book that parents will enjoy reading to their kids.
“Wombat” (Candlewick) by Christopher Cheng and illustrated by Liz Duthie. This picture book teaches kids about the wombat, Australia’s “bulldozer of the bush.”
“The Wedding Party” (Amazon Crossing) by Liu Xinwu and translated by Jeremy Tiang. A wedding party is planned in a Beijing courtyard. Set at a pivotal point after the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution, Xinwu’s tale weaves together a rich tapestry of characters, intertwined lives, and stories within stories. A touching, hilarious portrait of life in this crowded city.
“The Secret Listener – An Ingenue In Mao’s Court” (Oxford) by Yuan-Tsung Chen tells the fascinating tale of an extraordinary life in a tumultuous China from the 1920s to the 1970s. It’s a vivid, compelling portrait of life, conflict and love among the elite and downtrodden circles in the Republican and Communist eras.
Newbery Medal winner Erin Entrada Kelly makes her middle-age level debut which she illustrates herself with “Maybe Maybe Marisol Rainey” (HarperCollins). It’s a story about friendship and being brave when you feel shy or shaky.
“Bodhi Sees the World – Thailand” (bala kids) is written and illustrated by Marisa Aragon Ware. A young girl finds herself in a foreign city, exploring the streets of Bangkok where she begins to experience the world through a new culture.
“Dragon Legend – The Dragon Realm Series, Book 2”(Sterling) by Katie & Kevin Tsang. When a friend is kidnapped and taken through a time portal, Billy Chan and his friends must travel through time on their dragons to save him in this middle-grade level adventure novel.
“Scars of War – The Politics of Paternity and Responsibility for the Amerasians of Vietnam” (University of Nebraska Press) by Sabrina Thomas. This book explores ideas of race, nation, and gender in the aftermath of war. Thomas exposes the contradictory approach of policymakers unable to reconcile Amerasian biracialism with the U.S. Code. As they created an inclusionary discourse deeming Amerasians worthy of American action, guidance, and humanitarian aid, federal policymakers simultaneously initiated exclusionary policies that designated these people unfit for American citizenship.
“India Mahdavi” (Chronicle) is the first monograph on this world-renowned, award-winning Iranian interior designer. Along with her design projects, the book highlights her custom furniture, lighting, accessories and brand collaborations in a visually stunning design that sets off the work.
“Of Arcs And Circles – Insights from Japan on Gardens, Nature and Art” (Stone Bridge Press) by Marc Peter Keane. From his vantage point as a garden designer and writer based in Kyoto, the author examines the world around him an delivers insights on the Japanese garden, the meaning of art and other fascinating topics.
“Happy Diwali” (Henry Holt) by Sanyukta Mathur and Courtney Pippin-Mathur. Pippin-Mathur also did the illustrations This radiant picture book celebrates Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights.
“Borderless – A Memoir Of A Young Revolutionary In The 21st Century” (Wake Up Press) by Gary Pak. A fifteen-year-old revolutionary of mixed ethnicities, narrates this story of promise and opportunity in a post-captitalist/post-imperialist country formerly part of the USA. Join this teenager and his sister on a journey through a city devastated by earthquakes and breed, but during a time when a new world of sharing and equality is being built from the ashes of the old.
“Ready for the Spotlight” (Candlewick) written and illustrated by Jaime Kim. This picture book demonstrates the sometimes competitive but always loving relationship between two sisters who shine in different ways. Little sister trains hard to be a ballerina but is always overshadowed by her big sister who gets the leading role.
“Roxy The Unisaurus Rex presents Oh NO! The Talent Show” (Feiwel & Friends) by Eva Chen and illustrated by Matthew Rivera. The annual talent show is coming. Many dinosaurs have brilliant skills to show off but Dexter feels like he has no talent at all. With encouragement from Roxy, he learns being a good friend could be the most important talent of all.
“Where Is Bena Bear?” (Henry Holt) written and illustrated by Mike Curato. Tiny is having a party but the bear is nowhere to be found. Searching for Bina, Tiny realizes something is wrong and sets out to make it right. A humorous picture book about friendship, understanding and embracing our loved ones just as they are (even if they are painfully shy).
“American Home” (Autumn House Press) by Sean Cho A. won the 2020 Autumn House Chapbook Prize. The poems reflect a keen eye on everyday occurrences and how these small events shape us as individuals.
“Genghis Chan on Drums” (Omnidawn), poems by John Yau. This noted arts writer and poet returns in his latest book to his alter-ego of Genghis Chan and lacerates with acerbic humor and wit the topics of the day, clichés about being Chinese, the language of philosophers and the residue of racism and popular culture.
“Usha and the Big Digger” (Charlesbridge) by Amitha Jagannath Knight and illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat. Part of the “storytelling Math” series in which books depict children using math as they play, build, and discover the world around them. When two kids look up at the seven stars in the sky, they see different things. One sees the Big Dipper and another sees the Big Digger and a cousin sees the Big Kite. What exactly is going on?
“Anzu The Great Kaiju” (Roaring Brook Press) written and illustrated by Benson Shum. All great Kaiju are born with a superpower to strike fear into the heart of their city but Anzu is different. Instead of mayhem, he likes mayflowers. Instead of striking fear, he prefers to be sincere. Can Anzu find a way to make his family proud and still stay true to himself. From this Disney illustrator comes this heartwarming book about making your own way and the unexpected power of gentleness.
“Idol Gossip” (Walker) by Alexander Leigh Young. A Korean American girl from San Francisco goes from singing lessons to a K-pop boot camp when she and her mom move to Seoul. This debut YA novel is all about dreaming big but staying true to your own values.
“Brown Boy Nowhere” (Skyscape) by Sheeryl Lim. When a 16 year old Filipino American boy is uprooted from his San Diego home to the middle of nowhere just as he plans to enter a big skateboarding competition, he can’t help but think that “life sucks”. And now he’s the only Asian in an all-white school. But being an outcast has its rewards when he bands together with the rest of his high school outsiders.
“Remembering Our Intimacies – Modelo, Aloha Aina, and Ea” (University of Minnesota Press) by Jamaica Healimeleikalani Osorio. Hawaiian “aloha ‘aina” is often described in Western political terms as nationalism, nationhood, or even patriotism. In this book, the author focuses on the personal and embodied articulations of aloha aina to detangle it from the effects of colonialism and occupation.
“Faraway” (Columbia University Press) byTaiwanese novelist Lo Yi-Chin and translated by Jeremy Tiang. A Taiwanese man finds himself stranded in mainland China while attempting to bring his comatose father home. He finds himself locked into a protracted struggle with byzantine hospital regulations while dealing with relatives he barely knows. A book that examines the rift between Taiwan and China on the most personal of levels.
“Manifest Technique – Hip Hop, Empire, and Visionary Filipino American Culture” (University of Illinois) by Mark R. Villegas. Filipino Americans have been innovators and collaborators in hip hop since the culture’s early days. But despite some success, the genre’s significance in Filipino American communities is often overlooked. The author takes into consideration the coast-to-coast hip hop scene to reveal how Filipino Americans have used music, dance, and visual art to create their worlds.
“Enforced Rustification In The Chinese Cultural Revolution” (Texas Review Press) by Jianqing Zheng sounds like an academic study when it actually is a poetic retelling of the author’s experience working in the countryside as a young student. It’s told in poems full of humor, wit and poignancy.
“Personal Attention Roleplay”(Metonymy Press) – Stories by Helen Chau Bradley. A young gymnast crushes on an older, more talented teammate while contending with an overworked mother. A newly-queer twenty-something juggles two intimate relationships. A codependent listicle writer becomes obsessed with a Japanese ASMR channel. A queer metal band’s summer tour unravels in the summer heat. These tales offer portrayals of awkward interactions and isolations of a generation, community and culture.
“Pure Invention – How Japan Made The Modern World” (Crown) by Matt Alt. Japan is the forge of the world’s fantasies: karaoke and the Walkman, manga and anime, Pac-Man, online imageboards and emojis. But in this book, a Japan media reporter proves in his investigation, these novelties did more than entertain, they paved the way for our perplexing modern lives.
“ABC Of Feelings”(Philomel) written and illustrated by Bonnie Lui. This picture book is a journey through the alphabet that shows kids it’s perfectly okay to feel many different things, sometimes all at once. The perfect read-aloud for little ones learning all about feelings and their ABC’s.
“Beasts Of A Little Land” (Ecco) is a novel by Juhea Kim. It is an epic story of love, war, and redemption set again the backdrop of the Korean independence movement. From the perfumed chambers of a courtesan school in Pyongyang to the glamorous cafes of a modernizing Seoul and the boreal forests of Manchuria, where battles rage, Juhea Kim’s unforgettable characters forge their own destinies as they wager their nation’s.
“Faultlines” (Custom House) by Emily Itani. A bittersweet love story of a bored Japanese housewife in a dilemma who must make choicesand a piercing portrait of female identity.
“Outside Voices, Please” (Cleveland University Press) is a new book of poetry by Valerie Hsiung due out October 5, 2021. “Hsiung orchestrates a symphony of voices, past, present, and prescient: time (and with it, history) compresses and expands, yielding long poetry sequences reminiscent of Myung Mi Kim’s sonic terrains and C.D. Wright’s documentary poetics.” – Diana Khoi Nguyen
“Heaven” (Europa Editions) by Mieko Kawakmi. From the best-selling author of “Breasts And Eggs”, a striking exploration of working women’s daily lives in Japan comes a new story of the experience of a teenage boy who is tormented by his schoolmates. It explores the meaning and experience of violence and the consolations of friendship. Translated from the Japanese by Sam Bett and David Boyd.
“Alma Presses Play” (Make Me A World) by Tina Cane. Alma is a half-Chinese and half-Jewish teenage girl going through changes with her Walkman on most of the time. Friends move away, love comes and goes and her parents divorce. In this world of confusing beginnings, middles, and endings, is Alma ready to press play on the soundtrack of her life?
“Japanese Dress in Detail (Thames & Hudson/Victoria & Albert Museum) by Josephine Rout is the catalog for an exhibition held in Britain in 2020. It brings together more than 100 items of clothing and reveals the intricacies of Japanese dress from the 18th century to the present and includes garments for women, men and children. The details have been selected for their exquisite beauty and craftsmanship and for how much they impart about the wearer’s identity.
A Way of Looking” (Silverfish Review Press) by Jianqing Zheng. Winner of the 2019 Gerald Cable Book Award. Zheng, shaped by the Cultural Revolution in China somehow ended up in Mississippi and fell in love with the blues and in this book, he takes the haiga Japanese literary form (one prose journal entry followed by the echo of a haiku poem to end it) and plants it in the deep south. autumn night/a freight train chugging/across the Yazoo.
“XOXO” (Harper Teen) by Axie Oh. A teenage romance that blossoms in L.A. and re-ignites in Seoul. A Korean American girl meets a Korean guy on his last day in the city of angels and sparks fly. But she forgets about him when he flies off to Seoul. But when the girl and her mother fly to Seoul to take care of an ailing grandmother, guess who she discovers is in her class. But he is not an ordinary guy, he’s in one of the most popular K-pop bands in the land. And in K-pop, dating is strictly forbidden. Read the book if you want to find out how this complex relationship turns out.
“Head – Hoard” (University of Chicago Press) by Atsuro Riley. Winner of the Alice Fay di Castagnola Award from the Poetry Society of America, juror Julie Carr had this to say about Riley’s new book – “A landscape charged with the bright light of discernment, where emotions are stirred by rhythmic torsion and sonic density.”
“Amira’s Picture Day” (Holiday House) by Reem Faruqi and illustrated by Fahmida Azim. A joyful and sensitive look at the Muslim holiday of Eid as seen through the eyes of a young girl who loves to celebrate but feels conflicted because her school class photo shoot happens the same day.
“Colorful” (Counterpoint) by Eto Mori. Translated from the Japanese by Jocelyne Allen. This popular novel in Japan finally finds its way to the U.S. in this English translation. A young adult tale of death, mental health and what it means to truly live. When a formless soul is given a second chance to return to earth and inhabit the body of a fourteen-year-old boy who has just committed suicide, things get complicated.
Now it’s becoming more common for foreign players to break into U.S. professional baseball but “MASHI – The Unfulfilled Baseball Dreams Of Masunori Murakami, The First Japanese Major Leaguer” (Nebraska) by Robert K. Fitts takes us back to 1964 and tells the story of Japan’s first major leaguer in America. A baseball pioneer’s tale.
“The Alpactory – Ready, Pack, Go!” (Harper) written and illustrated (charmingly, I might add) by Ruth Chan. Most kids when embarking on a trip have trouble deciding what and how to pack. Let an alpaca with unusual packing skills be your guide as you contemplate your next journey.
“In The Watchful City” (Tor Dot Com) by S. Qiouyi Lu. Anima is an extrasensory human with the task of surveilling and protecting the city. But what happens when a mysterious outsider enters this world with curiosities from around the world? A multifaceted story of borders, power, diaspora and transformation.
“City of Illusion” (Viking Graphic) is the graphic novel follow-up to Victoria Ying’s “City of Secrets”. In this sequel our child heroes Hannah and Ever live with the Morgan family in peace until Mr. Morgan is kidnapped. The kids get in a spat with street magicians but the two must learn to work together if the mystery of the missing is ever solved.
“Silent Parade – A Detective Galileo Novel” (Minotaur) by Keigo Higashino. Detective Galileo, the author’s best-loved character from “The Devotion of Suspect X” returns in a complex and challenging mystery – several murders, decades apart, with no solid evidence. DCI Kusanagi turns once again to his college friend, Physics professor and occasional police consultant Manbu Yukawa, known as Detective Galileo, to help solve the string of impossible to prove murders.
“The Rice in the Pot Goes Round and Round” (Orchard) by Wendy Wan-Long Shang and illustrated by Lorian Tu. A clever twist on “The Wheels on the Bus” in which the eating of Chinese food is celebrated with love and laughter within a multi-generational family.
Ghost Food (One World) by Pik-Shuen Fung. A sparely written novel about a first generation of immigrants in Canada whose father decides to stay in Hong Kong earning him the title of “astronaut” father. With a lonely mother and ill father, a daughter struggles to understand her family history revealing threads of matrilineal history and the inheritance of stories and silences.
“Intimacies” (Riverhead) by Katie Kitamura. An American woman newly relocated to The Hague works as an interpreter at a war crimes tribunal. Interpreting for a notorious former president accused of crimes against humanity, and entangled in a complicated love affair with a married man, she wrestles with mounting professional and personal dramas.
“On The Ho Chi Minh Trail –The Blood Road, The Women Who Defended It, The Legacy”(ASIALINK, London) by Sherry Buchanan. Buchanan reveals the stories of the women who defended the Trail against the sustained American bombing campaign – the most ferocious in modern warfare – and of the artists who drew them. She focuses on what life was really like for the women and men under fire, bringing a unique perspective to the history of the Vietnam War.
“Not Here to Be Liked” (Katherine Tegen Books) by Michelle Quach. This young adult novel is about a high school girl Eliza Quan who sees herself as the perfect candidate to be editor of her school paper until an ex-jock white male candidate appears and threatens her ambitions. To thwart his challenge, she writes a viral essay inspiring a feminist movement. But what happens when she starts to like the guy?
“Anne’s Cradle – The Life & Works of Hanako Muraoka” (Nimbus) by Eri Muraoka as translated by Cathy Hirano. Hanako Muraoka is revered in Japan for her translation of L. M Montgomery’s children’s classic, “Anne of Green Gables.” Because of her translation the book had a massive and enduring popularity in that country. This bestselling biography of Muraoka written by her granddaughter, traces the complex and captivating story of a woman who risked her freedom and devoted her life to bringing quality children’s literature to the people during a period of tumultuous change in Japan.
“Second Sister” (Black Cat) by Chan Ho-Kei. When a schoolgirl commits suicide by leaping from the twenty-second floor, her older sister refuses to believe it. What follows is a cat-and-mouse game through the streets of Hong Kong as big sister hunts for the truth about the murder and the murderer.
“Faraway Places” (Diode Editions) by Teow Lim Goh. The poems in this book reside in the spaces between the wild and the tamed, from orchid gardens and immense seas to caged birds and high alpine landscapes. It resists narrative and instead inhabits the residues of experience. It may be a private dictionary.
“Jenny Mei Is Sad” (Little, Brown and Company) written and illustrated by Tracey Subisak. This book introduces young readers to the complexity of sadness and shows them that the best way to be a good friend – especially to someone sad – is by being there for the fun, the not-fun, and everything in between. Charmingly illustrated.
“Vessel – A Memoir” (HarperVia) by Cai Chongda. This tender collection of personal essays by the Editorial Director of GQ China spotlights the family, friends and neighbors of his small town who helped shape him as he struggled to understand himself and what the future might bring as a young boy from simple means.
“A Way of Looking” (Silver Fish Review Press) by Jianqing Zheng. Half prose, half verse, this book is a heartfelt account of exile and homecoming. Uprooted from Chinese soil after the Cultural Revolution, this immigrant found new roots in the rich dark soil of the Mississippi delta and the home of the blues. Winner of the 2019 Gerald Cable Book Award.
“Singing Emptiness – Kumar Gandharva Performs The Poetry Of Kabir” (Seagull) by Linda Hess. In this book, two men, five centuries apart, make contact with each other through poetry, music and performance. A great twentieth-century Hindustani classical vocalist takes up the challenge of singing the songs of Kabir, the great fifteenth century poet.
“Boys I Know” (Peachtree Teen Books) by Anna Gracia. A high school senior navigates messy boys and messier relationships in this bitingly funny and much-needed look into the overlap of Asian American identity and teen sexuality. June Chu is leaving high school to face an unknown world, battling her mother’s expectations and the drama of relationships and unsure on how she should work her path through it all.
“The Many Meanings of Meilan” (Kokila) by Andrea Wang. Meilan’s world is made up of a few key ingredients: her family’s beloved matriarch, the bakery the family owns and a run in Boston’s Chinatown; and her favorite Chinese fairy tales. But things change after her grandmother dies putting the family on the road in search of home. This young adult novel is an exploration of all the things it’s possible to grieve, the injustices large and small that make us rage, and the peace that’s unlocked when we learn to find home within ourselves.
A God at the Door” (Copper Canyon) by Tishani Doshi. Doshi is an award-winningwriter and dancer of Welsh-Gujarati descent. She has published seven books of fiction and poetry. This new volume of poems calls on the extraordinary minutiae of nature and humanity to redefine belonging and unveil injustice.
“Finding My Voice” (Soho) is a reprint of a classic young adult novel by Marie Myong-Ok Lee. It is a timeless coming-of-age story of a Korean American teenage girl who attends an all-white high school in Minnesota. She struggles to fit in while being different. When she falls for a popular white football player. Can this relationship withstand the bigotry of a small town and her family’s disapproval?
“Tokyo Ever After”(Flatiron) by Emiko Jean. It’s hard growing up Japanese American in a small, mostly-white Northern California town with a single mom. But when Izumi or “Izzy” as she’s known discovers her missing dad is the crown prince of Japan, things become surreal. Traveling to Japan to find her dad, her life is turned upside down. Not American enough in the States, not Japanese enough in Japan. Will Izumi ever land on her feet?
“The Bombay Prince” (Soho) by Sujata Massey. This popular mystery writer’s latest book is a Perveen Mistry series volume. Bombay’s fist female lawyer tries to bring justice to the family of a murdered female Parsi student just as the city streets erupt into riots protesting British rule. Set in 1920s Bombay.
“Angel & Hannah – A Novel in Verse” (One World) by Ishle Yi Park.The electricity of first love in the heart of New York’s neighborhoods. When a Korean American girl from Queens meets a Puerto Rican American boy from Brooklyn at aquincecanera, sparks fly and so does family opposition and cultural complexity. This former poet laureate of Queens uses bursts oflanguage and imagery in sonnet and song form to bring alive the glow of first love.
“Made In Korea” (Simon & Schuster) by Sarah Suk. A “rom-com” novel debut depicts two entrepreneurial teens who butt heads – and maybe fall in love- while running competing Korean beauty businesses at their high school.
“At The End Of The Matinee” (Amazon Crossing) by Keiichiro Hirano as translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter. Billed as a love story and psychological thriller, this novel traces the years long relationship between a concert guitarist and a journalist and examines whether the relationship will endure and perhaps blossom into something deeper.
“Finding Junie Kim” (Harper) by Ellen Oh. A young adult novel about a Korean American girl who tries to fit in at school by not sticking out. But when racist graffiti appears at her middle school, she must make a decision. When a teacher assigns an oral history project, Junie decides to interview her grandparents about the Korean war and her world changes.
“A Pho Love Story” (Simon & Schuster) by Loan Le is a romantic YA rom-com in which two Vietnamese American teens must navigate their new found love amid their family’s age-old feud about their competing pho restaurants.
“If I Were A Tree” (Lee & Low) by Andrea Zimmerman as imaginatively illustrated by local artist Jin Jing Tsong. This picture book traces two siblings journey into the woods and how they use the five senses to explore the natural world. Tsong’s kaleidoscopic art makes the wooded world come to life and illuminates the author’s poetic ode to trees.
“Death Fugue” (Restless) by Sheng Keyi as translated by Shelly Bryant. This novel is a dystopian allegory of the Tiananmen Square massacre and banned in China.
“When Father Comes Home” (Orchard) is written and illustrated by Sarah Jung. June’s father is like a goose: he flies away for long periods of time so when he comes home, it’s a special occasion. This picture book turns the story of migrant fathers who work abroad in hopes of widening the field of opportunity for their children into a heart-warming, reflective tale.
“The Intimacies of Conflict – Cultural Memory and The Korean War” (NYU) by Daniel Y. Kim. The author delves into novels, films and photos to reconstruct memories of war and what it means to Koreans, Asian Americans and people of color
“The Tangle Root Palace” (Tachyon) by Marjorie Liu (“Monstress”} is her debut collection of dark, lush and spellbinding fantasy fiction. It’s full of thorny tales of love, revenge and new beginnings.
“Tell Me Who You Are: Sharing Our Stories of Race, Culture, And Identity” (Penguin Random House) by Winona Guo and Priya Vulchi. Two 17 year old girls (a Chinese American and an Indian American) take a year off after high school and travel the country asking Americans how race has impacted their lives. Out of 500 stories, they edited it down to 115 for this anthology.
Inspired by the Peabody Award-winning podcast, “The Unexplainable Disappearance of Mars Patel” (Walker) by Sheila Chari is a young adult thriller. As kids are disappearing one by one from a middle school and their parents don’t seem to care, Mars Patel and his crew go on a desperate search for answers.
“Mapping Abundance Fora Planetary Future- Kanaka Maoli and Critical Settler Cartographies in Hawai’i” (Duke) by Candance Fujikane. Fujikane criticizes settler colonial cartographies that diminish life and instead highlights the all encompassing voices of Hawaiian communities and their perspective of abundant healing and protection for the land.
“I Am A Bird” (Candlewick) by Hope Lim as illustrated by Hyewon Yum. When a little girl goes on her morning bike ride with her dad, she imitates the sounds of birds. But when she sees a strange woman with a stern demeanor and a mysterious bag, she becomes frightened. A children’s book that encourages readers to embrace over similarities rather then letting our differences divide us.
“Planet Omar Incredible Rescue Mission” (Putnam) by Zanib Mian as illustrated by Nasaya Mafaridik. Omar is excited about his first trip to Pakistan but then tragedy strikes. His favorite teacher goes missing. Could his teacher been abducted by aliens? Omar investigates. Will creative thinking and a galactic spirit of adventure help solve this young adult mystery?
“Much Ado About Baseball” (Yellow Jacket/Little Bee) by Rajani LaRocca. When Trish finds herself on the same summer baseball team as Ben, her math competition rival, two people must set aside their animosity and join together to help their team win. Will solving a math puzzle help the team succeed? Trish and Ben think so.
“The Unicorn Rescue Society – The Secret of the Himalayas (Dutton) by Adam Gidwitz & Hena Khan is a continuation of the New york Times bestselling young adult series about the juvenile members of this group who travel to the rugged mountains of Pakistan to rescue a unicorn.
“The Elephant Doctor of India” (Chicago Review Press) by Janie Chodosh. When a young elephant touching a sagging electric line in Assam, India gets stuck in the mud, there is only one person to call – Dr. Sarma, the elephant doctor. Chodosh spends time with the doctor and reveals to young readers what this unique veterinarian does for the elephants he encounters.
“Kudo Kids – The Mystery in Manhattan” (Razorbill) by Maia and Alex Shibutani. This brother & sister Olympic ice skating pair have turned their hands at writing young adult novels. The Kudo Kids come to New York to see the sights but when a dress from their fashion designer auntie’s collection goes missing, they end up in a chase around the city to nab the culprit
“From Little Tokyo With Love” (Viking) by Sarah Kuhn. Rika is an adopted bi-racial girl with formidable judo skills and a fiery temper. When she hears rumors in her neighborhood that her real mother is not only alive but a Hollywood movie star, she goes on a quest to find her. Accompanied by actor friend Hank, she must make some big decisions that could change the direction in her own life.
“Dial A for Aunties” (Berkley) by Jesse Q. Sutanto. In this rom-com/murder mystery mash-up of mistaken identity and sisterhood, a wedding photographer enlists the aid of her mother and her sisters in hiding the dead body of her blind date while attempting to pull off an opulent wedding for a billionaire client.
“Renegade Flight” (Razorbill) by Andrea Tang. In this YA fantasy adventure, a young pilot-in-training is grounded when found cheating on an entrance exam. Eager to re-join, she competes in a combat tournament to regain entry only to find she must battle a strangely attractive nemesis.
“Daddy’s Love For Me” (Mascot) by Sarah and JoAnn Jung as illustrated by Chiara Civati. A daughter feels resentment towards her overworked dad when he has no time to spend with her and show his love. When she overhears a conversation between her parents, she realizes how wrong she was.
“Counting Down With You” (Inkyard) by Tashie Bhuiyan. A reserved Bangladeshi teenage girl looks forward to a restful break when her demanding parents go abroad. Instead, she is roped into tutoring the school’s resident bad boy and then talked into a fake-dating façade. But then her life changes as the days go by and the two get to know each other.
“Nina Soni, Sister Fixer” (Peachtree) by Kashmira Sheth as illustrated by Jenn Kocsmiersky. This continuing series on the adventures of a young Indian American girl who looks for a new project while at the same time getting aggravated by her little sister’s behavior. Maybe there is a way to solve both issues at the same time?
“Fatima’s Great Outdoors” (Kokila) by Ambreen Tariq as illustrated by Stevie Lewis. This picture book is a celebration of an immigrant family’s first outdoor camping trip and how it brings them all together for once inside one big tent under a canopy of stars.
“Queen of Ice” (Duckbill) by Devika Rangachari. This young adult historic novel delves into the turbulent history of tenth-century Kashmir and Didda, princess of Lohara who learns how to hold her own in a court ridden with factions and conspiracies.
“Foreign Bodies” (Norton) by Kimiko Hahn. Inspired by her encounter with the Jackson Collection of ingested curiosities at the Mutter Museum, this poet investigates the grip that seemingly insignificant objects have on our lives.
“Black Water Sister” (ACE) by Zen Cho. A modern fantasy tale of ghosts, gods and the eternal bonds of family ties in the setting of modern-day Malaysia. A young woman returns to Penang and reunites with her extended family while at the sa
“Leave Society” (Vintage) is Tao Lin’s first work of fiction since 2013. It follows a thirty-year-old novelist living part-time with his parents in Taiwan and part-time in New York who grows increasingly alienated from friends and community back in the U.S. As he rotates between places, the novel chronicles his growth as son, writer and misfit.
“The Henna Wars” (Page Street Kids) by Adiba Jaigirdar. This romcom about two teen girls with rival henna businesses who find despite their competition, they have to come to terms with a realization of the affection they have for each other.
“In the Watchful City” (TorDotCom) by S. Qiouy Lu. An unforgettable futuristic tale in a secondary world that feels familiar in essence, and that centers trans, nonbinary, queer, mentally ill and Chinese-coded identities. It asks the eternal question, “What good is a city if it can’t protect its people?”
“Clues to the Universe” (Quill Tree) is the Young Adult debut novel by Chrsitina Li. What do an aspiring young rocket scientist reeling from her father’s death and an artistic boy who loves superheroes and comic books have in common? When the two become science class partners, they embark on an adventure and discover themselves while banding together to confront bullying, grief and their own differences.
“Love Without A Storm” (Blood Axe Books) by Arundhathi Subramaniam is filled with poems that celebrate an expanding kinship: of passion and friendship, mythic quest and modern day longing, in a world animated by dialogue and dissent, delirium and silence.
“Heiress Apparently” (Abrams) by Diana Ma is the first book in an epic, romantic young adult series following the fictionalized descendants of the only officially recognized regent of China. When a young Chinese American woman from Illinois embarks on an acting career in Los Angeles having abandoned plans for college – things turn strange. When she gets a role in “M. Butterfly” shooting in Beijing, she uncovers a royal Chinese legacy in her family her parents would rather she never knew.
“Terminal Boredom – Stories” (Verso) by Izumi Suzuki. This book of short stories introduces readers to a cult figure in Japanese literature who takes a unique slant on science fiction and concerns about technology, gender and imperialism.
“Forty Two Greens – Poems of Chonggi Mah” (Forsythia) as translated by Youngshil Cho. Winner of the Korean Literary Award, this poet’s search for the infinite in nature illuminates moments of beauty in the subconscious.
“Beyond Line: The Art of Korean Writing” (LACMA/Prestel) by Stephen Little and Virginia Moon is the exhibition catalog for a major show that illuminates the restrained beauty strength and flexibility of Korean calligraphy. It is the first exhibition held outside Asia to focus on the history of writing and calligraphy in Korea.
“A Sky Beyond The Storm” (Razorbill) is the finale to the popular “Ember in the Ashes” series by Sabaa Tahir. This fantasy series finds the soul catcher must look beyond the borders of his land and take on a mission that could save or destroy – all that he holds dear.
“The Surprising Power of a Dumpling” (Scholastic) by Wai Chin. A teenage girl balances looking after her siblings, working in her dad’s restaurant and taking care of a mother suffering from a debilitating mental illness. A deep true-to-life exploration through the complex crevices of culture, mental illness and family.
“The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World” (Overlook) by Laura Imai Messina. A Japanese woman loses her mother and daughter in the tsunami. When she hears of a phone booth where people come to speak to departed loved ones, she makes a pilgrimage there only to find her grief won’t allow her to pick up the phone. A novel based on a true story.
“Ten – A Soccer Story” (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) by Shamini Flint. A good half-Indian girl in 1980’s Malaysia isn’t supposed to play a “boys” sport but Maya is all game as she achieves her goals while placating a bossy Indian grandmother and holding together a mixed race family on the verge of drifting apart. A young adult novel that will inspire.
“The Secret Talker” (HarperVia), a novel by Geling Yan as translated by Jeremy Tiang. Hongmei and Glen seem to have the perfect idyll life in the Bay Area even though their marriage is falling apart. When a secret admirer contacts Hongwei on the internet, his flirting turns into an obsession.
“The Collected Poems of Chika Sagawa” (Modern Library) won the Pen Award for “Poetry in Translation” for translator/poet Sawako Nakayasu. Now it’s brought back in print in the new Modern Library Torchbearers Series that highlights women who wrote on their own terms, with boldness, creativity and a spirit of resistance. Sagawa was a turn-of-the-century daringly experimental voice in Tokyo’s avant-garde poetry scene. Her life was cut short by cancer at the age of 24 but the words she left behind linger on.
“CURB” (Nightboat) is a new collection of poems by Divya Victor. This book documents how immigrants and Americans both, navigate the liminal sites of everyday living, ripped by violence and paved over with possibilities of belonging.
“Séance Tea Party” (RH Graphic) by Reimena Yee. A lonely girl meets a ghost who haunts her home and finds a new friend. But what happens as the girl grows older and the ghost stays the same age?
“Nina Soni, Master of The Garden” (Peachtree) by Kashmira Sheth and illustrated by Jenn Kocsmiersky. This young adult series about an Indian American fourth grader finds her working on a garden project with her siblings supervised by their landscape architect mom. What they hadn’t counted on was the unpredictability of mothernature. Can Nina Soni help this garden survive?
Mindy Kim, Class President” (Aladdin) by Lyla Lee is part of a series of books on the adventures of a teenage Korean American girl. In this story, she decides to run for class president but first she must overcome her fear of public speaking.
“The Truffle Eye” (Zephyr) by Vann Nguyen is the debut collection of poems by this Vietnamese-Israeli poet as translated by Adriana X. Jacobs. In it she tackles questions of identity and cultural legacy from points of emotion and shock.
“Flowering Tales – Women Exorcising History in Heian Japan”(Columbia University Press) by Takeshi Watanabe. This is the first extensive study of this historical Japanese tale. It unravels 150 years of happenings in Heian era society penned by female writers.
“Pippa Park Raises Her Game” (Fabled Films Press) by Erin Yun. This loose reimaging of “Great Expectations” follows a young Korean American girl learning to navigate her new life at an elite private school in this young adult novel.
“Some Girls Walk Into The Country They Are From” (Wave)is a new book by Sawako Nakayasu, an artist working with language, and translation – separately and in various combinations. She, alone is responsible for introducing a wide variety of modern Japanese poets to English readers throughout the years with her fresh and skillful translations. This new volume is a multilingual work of both original and translated poetry.
“A Taste for Love” (Razorbill) by Jennifer Yen. When a rebellious teenage girl agrees to help her mom’s bakery stage a junior competition, she soon realizes it’s a setup. All of the contestants are young Asian American men her mom has handpicked for her to date. What can she do?
“That Was Now, This Is Then” (Greywolf Press) is the first new collection from Paris Review Editor Vijay Seshadri since his 2014 Pulitzer Prizewinning book, “3 Sections.” Rosanna Warren says of this new book, “These are poems of lacerating self-awareness and stoic compassion. It is a book we need, right now.”
“Midsummer’s Mayhem” (Yellow Jacket) by Rajani LaRocca. When her dad , a renowed food writer loses his sense of taste, it puts a damper on this eleven-year old girl’s dream of becoming a baker and winning a cooking contest. When she meets a boy in the forest, he teaches her about new natural ingredients. Will the everyday magic of baking give her the courage she needs to save her father?
“Every Reason We Shouldn’t” (Tor Teen) by Sara Fujimura. When a teenage girl’s Olympic figure skater dreams fade, she meets a young man at her family’s rink who’s driven to get to the Olympics in speed skating. As a rivalry develops, so does a romance.
“My Name Will Grow Wide Like A Tree” (Greywolf) by Yi Lei and translated from the Chinese by Changtai Bi and Tracy K. Smith. Yiyun Li says of this book, “Yi Lei, one of China’s most original and independent poets, documents not only Chinese history in the past four decades, but also more importantly a woman’s private history of rebellion and residence.”
“Disappear Doppelganger Disappear” (Little A) is by the author of “The Hundred-Year Flood”, Matthew Salesses. Laura Van den Berg writes “How to live in a world that refuses to see you? Matt Kim’s intoxicating battle with his mysterious doppelganger moves him deeper and deeper into the vast and urgent sea of this question – and towards a possible answer. Inventive and profound, mordantly hilarious and wildly moving.”
“The Boys in the Back Row” (Levine Querido) by Mike Jung. When band geeks, comic nerds and best friends Eric and Matt tire of being bullied by racist comments and being called “gay”, they hatch a plan to meet a famous comic book artist during regional marching competition but an enemy has other ideas.
“The Girl Who Stole an Elephant” (Peachtree) by Nizrana Farook. Deep adventures in the Sri Lankan jungle await young readers as a nobleman’s rebellious daughter steals the queen’s jewelry and makes her escape on the king’s elephant. How will things turn out in the end?
“Pink Mountain on Locust Island” (Coffee House) by Jamie Marina Lau. In her debut novel, shortlisted for Australia’s prestigious Stella Prize, old hazy vignettes conjure a multi-faceted world of philosophical angst and lackadaisical violence. A teenage girl drifts through a monotonous existence in a Chinatown apartment until her dad and boyfriend plot a dubious enterprise that requires her involvement.
“Kimono Culture – The Beauty of Chiso” (Worchester Art Museum) by Vivian Li and Christine D. Starkman tells the story of a Kyoto-based designer that is one of the oldest and most prestigious kimono makers in Japan today.
“Everything I Thought I Knew” (Candlewick) by Shannon Takaoka. A teenage girl wonders if she’s inherited more than just a heart from her donor when odd things begin to happen. As she searches for answers, what she learns will lead her to question everything she assumed she knew.
“Goat Days” (Seagull Books) by Benyamin as translated by Joseph Koyippally. A poor young man in Southern India dreams of getting a job in a Persian Gulf country so he can earn enough money to send to his family back home. When his wish becomes reality, things don’t turn out as planned and he is locked into a slave-like existence herding goats in the desert. Circ*mstances force him to conceive of a hazardous scheme to escape his life of loneliness and alienation. But will it be enough?
“Last Tang Standing” (Putnam) by Lauren Ho. “Crazy Rich Asians” meets “Bridget Jones” in this funny debut novel about the pursuit of happiness, surviving one’s thirties intact and opening one’s self up to love.
“AN I NOVEL” (Columbia) by Minae Mizumura as translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter. This novel focuses on a single day of a Japanese expatriate in America as she reflects on her life in this country and why she wants to return to Japan to become a writer and write again in Japanese.
“Sacrificial Metal” (Conduit Books & Ephemera) by Esther Lee. It won the Minds on Fire Open Book Prize. Sean Dorsey writes that the book “dances with astute curiosity and deep tenderness across the shifting grounds of grief, touch, bearing witness, memory, and our obstinate human instinct for future planning. With great compassion, Lee’s poems remind us that everything human eventually unravels…”
“Forbidden Memory – Tibet During the Cultural Revolution” (Potomac) by Tsering Dorje. Edited by Robert Barnett and translated by Susan T. Chen. The author uses eyewitness accounts with expert analysis to tell the story of how Tibet was shaken by foreign invasion and cultural obliteration. This book is a long-overdue reckoning of China’s role in Tibet’s tragic past.
“Paper Bells” (The Song Cave) by Phan Nhien Hao and translated by Hai-Dang Phan is a new volume of poems by a poet shaped by the Vietnam War, forced to re-start a life as a teenager in the U.S. His poems bear witness to a delicate balance between two countries and cultures.
“So This Is Love: a Twisted Tale” (Disney) by Elizabeth Lim. A youngadult re-telling of the Cinderella story. In this one, Cinderella leaves the house where she works and gets a job as the palace seamstress. Here she becomes witness to a grand conspiracy to overthrow the king. Can she find a way to save the kingdom?
“From Maybe To Forever – An Adoption Story” (Creston) by M. L. Gold and N. V. Fong as illustrated by Jess Hong. Told from a big sister’s point of view, this picture book makes the complicated adoption process clear for the youngest readers and the colorful art show
“Butterfly Sleep” (Tupelo) by Kim Kyung Ju as translated by Jake Levine is a historical drama based in the early Joson Dynasty. With a mixture of magic realism and dark humor, he tells an existentialist allegory of Korean’s rapid development. This play is a modern fable of a rapidly changing country that must confront its ghosts.
“Lion Boys and Fan Girls” (Epigram) by Pauline Loh looks at teenage boys who make a pledge to ban dating and focus on lion dancing. But they must contend with unusual girls and cyberbullying. The rich culture of Singapore and the fascinating history of lion dance make this a compelling young adult read.
“People From My Neighborhood – Stories” (Soft Skull) by Hiromi Kawakami and translated by Ted Goossen. From the author of the internationally bestselling “Strange Weather in Tokyo”, this new book is a collection of interlinking stories that masterfully blend the mundane and the mythical. In these people’s lives, details of the local and everyday slip into accounts of duels, prophetic dreams, revolutions and visitations from ghosts and gods. Here is a universe ruled by mystery and transformation.
“A Bond Undone” (St. Martin’s Griffin) by Jin Yong is the second volume of “Legends of The Condor Heroes”, one of Asia’s most popular martial arts novels. Translated by Gigi Chang.
“Taiwan In Dynamic Transition – Nation Building And Democratization” (UW) edited by Ryan Dunch and Ashley Esarey. This book provides an up-to-date assessment of contemporary Taiwan highlighting that country’s emergent nationhood and its significance for world politics.
“The Journey of Liu Xiabao – From Dark Horse to Nobel Laureate” (Potomac) edited by Joanne Leedom-Ackerman with Yu Zhang, Jie Li and Tienchi Martin-Liao. Liu Xiabao was more than a dissident poet and this collection of essays capture the intellectual and activist spirit of this late literary critic and democracy icon.
“Harris Bin Potter And The Stoned Philosopher” (Epigram) by Suffian Hakim. This young Singapore-based writer’s parody of Harry Potter bases the story in Malaysia and seasons it with local and pop cultural references.
“Mindy Kim and the Lunar New Year Parade” (Aladdin) by Lyla Lee and illustrated by Dung Ho. Mindy is excited to go to the annual lunar new year parade but things don’t go as planned. Can she still find a way to celebrate?
“From Maybe To Forever – An Adoption Story” (Creston) by M.L. Gold and N.V. Fong and illustrated by Jess Hong. Told from the view of an eager older sister, this is an endearing story about adoption from an often-neglected point of view.
