Best of Both Worlds
Children's books on the Asian/Pacific Islander experience in America
Fiction |
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| Author | Title |
| Brown, Jackie | Little Cricket |
| Twelve-year-old Kia and her Hmong family flee from the mountains of Laos to Saint Paul, Minnesota. | |
| Himelblau, Linda | The Trouble Begins |
| Reunited with his family, fifth grader Du struggles to adapt to his new home in the United States. | |
| Kadohata, Cynthia | Kira-Kira |
| Two Japanese-American sisters grow up in rural Georgia during the late 1950s and early 1960s, but must face the despair when one sister becomes terminally ill. | |
| Lee, Milly | Landed |
| After leaving his village in China, twelve-year-old Sun is held at the immigration station on Angel Island. | |
| Lin, Grace | The Year of the Dog |
| A young Taiwanese American girl sets out to apply the lessons of the Chinese Year of the Dog, those of making best friends and finding oneself. Sequel. | |
| Look, Lenore | Alvin Ho: Allergic to Camping, Hiking, and Other Natural Disasters |
| When Alvin's father takes him campint to instill a love of nature, like that of Henry David Thoreau, Alvin makes a new friend and learns that he can be brave. | |
| Marsden, Carolyn | The Gold-Threaded Dress |
| When Oy and her Thai American family move to a new neighborhood, her third-grade classmates tease and exclude her because she is different. | |
| Park Frances & Park, Ginger | Good-bye, 382 Shin Dang Dong |
| Jangmi finds it hard to say goodbye to her home in Korea when her family moves to America. | |
| Park, Linda Sue | Archer's Quest |
| Twelve-year-old Kevin Kim helps Chu-mong, a legendary king of ancient Korea, return to his own time. | |
| Perkins, Mitali | The Sunita Experiment |
| When her grandparents come for a visit, thirteen-year-old Sunita finds herself resenting her Indian heritage. | |
| Sheth, Kashmire | Blue Jasmine |
| When her grandmother falls ill and twelve-year-old Seema visits India again, she begins to understand how it is possible to have more than one home. | |
| Uchida, Yoshiko | The Best Bad Thing |
| Rinko, a Japanese American girl, has to spend the summer of 1935 helping strange Mrs. Hata on her farm in Oakland. | |
| Yang, Bell | Hannah Is My Name |
| A young Chinese girl and her parents emigrate to San Francisco and anxiously await their green cards. | |
| Yee, Lisa | Stanford Wong Flunks Big-Time |
| After flunking sixth-grade English, a basketball prodigy must struggle to pass his summer-school class, keep his failure a secret, and satisfy his demanding father. | |
| Yee, Paul | Tales From Gold Mountain: Stories of the Chinese in the New World |
| A collection of stories reflecting the gritty optimism of the Chinese building a place for themselves in North America. | |
| Yep, Laurence | The Case of the Lion Dance |
| When $2000 is stolen during the opening of a restaurant, Lily and her aunt, Chinese American move actress, search for the thief in San Francisco's Chinatown. | |
| Yin | Coolies |
| Two brothers come to the United States to help build the transcontinental railroad. | |
Young Teen Fiction |
|
| Author | Title |
| De La Cruz, Melissa | Fresh Off the Boat |
| Fourteen-year-old Vicenza Arambullo struggles to fit in at her exclusive, all-girl private school. | |
| Ly, Many | Roots and Wings |
| While in Florida to give her grandmother a Cambodian funeral, fourteen-year-old Grace finally gets answers about the father she never met. | |
| Perkins, Mitali | First Daughter: Extreme American Makeover |
| During her father's presidential campaign, campaign staffers want to give sixteen-year-old Sameera, who was adopted from Pakistan, a more "all-American" image. | |
Young Teen Graphic Novel |
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| Author | Title |
| Yang, Lene Luen | American Born Chinese |
| Three Interrelated stories about young Chinese Americans trying to fit in. | |
Non-Fiction |
||
| Call Number | Author | Title |
| 305.8 H856h | Hoyt-Goldsmith | Hoang Anh: A Vietnamese American Boy |
| A Vietnamese American boy describes the traditional culture and customs that shape their daily lives in San Rafael. | ||
| 305.8 St432e | Stepanchuk, Carol | Exploring Chinatown: A Children's Guide to Chinese Culture |
| Learn about Chinese art, calligraphy, festivals, and other cultural activities. | ||
| 305.8 T139 | Takaki, Ronald | The Asian American Experience (Series) |
| An in-depth series that explores the history of immigration, past and present. Six volumes, including: Spacious Dreams - the first wave of Asian immigration; Democracy and Race - Asian Americans and World War II; Strangers at the Gates Again - Asian American immigration after 1965. | ||
| 398.2 Y43r | Yep, Laurence | The Rainbow People |
| A collection of twenty Chinese folk tales, as told by some oldtimers newly settled in the United States. | ||
| 745.5 Sh16L2 | Shalant, Phyllis | Look What We've Brought You From Vietnam |
| Crafts, games, recipes, stories, and other cultural activities from new Americans. | ||
| 759.95 Ob1r | Ross, Michael Elsohn | Nature Art With Chiura Obata |
| The life and work of nature artist Chiura Obata. Includes tips on how readers can make their own nature art. | ||
| 791.43 W846y | Yoo, Paula | Shining Star: The Anna May Wong Story |
| Film star Anna May Wong achieves her dream of becoming an actress. | ||
| 791.82 Sa99c | Say, Allen | El Chino |
| A biography of Bill Wong, a Chinese American who became a famous bullfighter in Spain. | ||
| 797.32 K12c | Crowe, Ellie | Surfer of the Century |
| A brief biography of Hawaiian Duke Kahanamoku, five-time Olympic champion and the father of modern surfing. | ||
| 811 P219t | Park, Linda Sue | Tap Dancing on the Roof: sijo (poems) |
| Sijo is a traditional Korean form of poetry with an unexpected humorous or ironic twist at the end. | ||
| 920 G27m | Moss, Marissa | Sky High: The True Story of Maggie Gee |
| The story of one of only two Chinese American Women Airforce Service Pilots to serve during World War II. | ||
| 920 K1232s | Stanley, Fay | The Last Princess: The Story of Princess Ka'iulani of Hawaii |
| Hawaii's last heir to the throne is denied her right to rule when the monarchy is abolished by the U.S. Government. | ||
| 920 N1453m | McCully, Emily Arnold | Manjiro: The Boy Who Risked His Life for Two Countries |
| A young man from Japan is shipwrecked, but later his knowledge of two cultures later led him to play an important role in the opening of Japan to the Western world. | ||
| 920 Uc4ai | Uchida, Yoshiko | The Invisible Thread: An Autobiography |
| Children's author, Yoshiko Uchido, describes growing up in Berkeley, California. | ||
| 920 Y43aL | Yep, Laurence | The Lost Garden |
| The author describes how he grew up as a Chinese American in San Francisco and how he came to use his writing to celebrate his family and his ethnic heritage. | ||
| 920.1 M818f | Morey, Janet Nomura and Dunn, Wendy | Famous Asian Americans |
| Brief biographies including author/illustrator Jose Aruego, U.S. Senator Daniel K. Inouye, astronaut Ellison S. Onizuka, architect I.M. Pei and many others. | ||
| 940.53 St25i | Stanley, Jerry | I Am An American: A True Story of Japanese Internment |
| Shi Nomura, a Japanese-American high school student interned at Manzanar during World War II, tells his story. | ||
| 979.46 F613a | Flanagan, Alice K. | Angel Island |
| A look at the immigration station on the West coast. | ||
| 996.5 H428c | Hermes, Jules | The Children of Micronesia |
| Photos and text show the daily lives of children in these Pacific islands. | ||
Want to get your hands on one of these books? Check the Berkeley Public Library catalog to see where you can get a copy!