Author: FINDER, SYDNEY

Multicultural Literature:
The Asian American Voice

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan (FIC TAN) REAL
In 1949 four Chinese women began meeting in San Francisco to play mah jong. They called their gathering the Joy Luck Club. Their stories ultimately display the double happiness that can be found in being both Chinese and American. First serials to Ladies' Home Journal, Atlantic Monthly, and San Francisco Focus.
Under the Blood-Red Sun
by Graham Salisbury (FIC SAL) HISTORICAL
Tomikazu Nakaji's biggest concerns are baseball, homework, and a local bully, until life with his Japanese family in Hawaii changes drastically after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941.
Native Speaker by Chang Rae Lee (FIC LEE)
MYSTERY
Henry Park is a Korean American private investigator who, in the course of spying on a New York City politician, comes to terms with his own sense of identity, family, and culture.
The Invisible Thread by Yoshiko Uchida (B UCH)
BIOGRAPHY
A children's author describes growing up in Berkeley, California, as a Nisei, second generation Japanese American, and her family's internment in a Nevada concentration camp during World War II.
The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka (FIC OTS)
HISTORICAL
Eight young women who are brought from Japan to San Francisco as "picture brides" in the early twentieth century struggle to adapt to their new husbands, language, and culture and raise children who reject their heritage and history.
Skunk Girl by Sheba Karim (FIC KAR) HUMOR
Nina Khan is not just the only Asian or Muslim student in her small-town high school in upstate New York, she also faces the legacy of her "Supernerd" older sister, body hair, and the pain of having a crush when her parents forbid her to date.
Finding My Hat by John Son (FIC SON) REAL
Jin-Han describes his life growing up with his mother and father, immigrants from Korea, and his little sister as they move to different cities with his parents' business.

Lili: a Novel of Tiananmen by Annie Wang (FIC WAN)
HISTORICAL
A young Chinese girl named Lili—who, in search of companionship, became a gang member after her parents were taken away to be "re-educated" and she was raped by a Communist Party leader-experiences a cultural and political awakening when she meets Roy, an American journalist who inspires her to live for something beyond herself.
Eyes of the Emperor by Graham Salisbury (FIC SAL)
HISTORICAL
Following orders from the United States Army, several young Japanese American men train K-9 units to hunt Asians during World War II.
Tangled Threads: a Hmong Girl’s Story
by Pegi Shea (FIC SHE) REAL
After ten years in a refugee camp in Thailand, thirteen-year-old Mai Yang travels to Providence, Rhode Island, where her Americanized cousins introduce her to pizza, shopping, and beer, while her grandmother and new friends keep her connected to her Hmong heritage.
Fixer Chao by Han Ong (FIC ONG) HUMOR
William Narciso Paulinha, a Filipino street hustler, teams up with a struggling writer to scam New York's upper class with their distorted teachings of Feng Shui.
American Dragons: Twenty Five Asian American Voices
(810.9 AME)
Includes short stories, poems, and excerpts from plays that relate what it is like growing up Asian-American.

PRHS
Library

A lot more Asian-American fiction books exist outside of this brochure. Just use keywords in our catalog to find them!

Media Center Information
Hours: Monday– Friday: 6:45-2:10 pm
End Zone: Mon-Thurs 2:10-4:30
Printing Info: $0.10 a page for B&W .....$1.00 a page for color
Checking out Books:
Books are checked out for 3 weeks and can be renewed. Overdue books fees are $0..10 a school day.
Students may have 3 books checked out at a time.
Students may not check out books until overdue books are returned and fines over $10 are payed off.
If you don’t find that book on the shelf, use our catalog kiosk to see if the book is available. If the book is checked out, we can notify you when it is returned– just put it on hold with us at the circulation desk.
Books are shelved by genre.

“We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams” (Jimmy Carter).

Bitter Melon by Cara Chow (FIC CHO) REAL
Frances, a Chinese-American student in a competitive school in San Francisco in the 1980s, begins to question her mother's insistence that she becomes a doctor when she accidentally enrolls in a speech class and discovers a hidden talent.
Subway Girl by P.J. Converse (FIC CON) ROMANCE
In Hong Kong, Chan Tze Man, called Simon Chan, leaves high school because he cannot master English, but when he befriends Amy, a Chinese American who knows little Chinese, their unlikely bond gives hope to both.
Shanghai Girls: a Novel by Lisa See (FIC SEE)
HISTORICAL
Sisters Pearl and May Chin are forced into marriages to Chinese men living in America after their father gambles away his wealth; but life in American proves more difficult than they expected.
American Born Chinese: a Graphic Novel
by Gene Yang (GN YAN) GRAPHIC NOVEL
Alternates three interrelated stories about the problems of young Chinese Americans trying to participate in the popular culture.
Stanford Wong Flunks Big-Time
by Lisa Yee (FIC YEE) HUMOR
After flunking sixth-grade English, basketball prodigy Stanford Wong must struggle to pass his summer-school class, keep his failure a secret from his friends, and satisfy his academically demanding father.
Thousand Pieces of Gold: a Biographical Novel
by Rutanne Lum McCunn (FIC MCC) HISTORICAL
The story of a Chinese-American pioneer woman who overcame poverty, foot-binding, and slavery to build a life of relative freedom in the American Northwest.

Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee (FIC YEE)
REAL
In a series of journal entries, eleven-year-old child prodigy Millicent Min records her struggles to learn to play volleyball, tutor her enemy, deal with her grandmother's departure, and make friends over the course of a tumultuous summer.
To the Golden Mountain: the Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad
by Lila Perl (331.7 PER)
Describes the experience of Chinese immigrants to the United States in the nineteenth century, their work on the transcontinental railroad, and also discusses the Chinese Exclusion Act, which barred Chinese workers from entering this country.
The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan (FIC TAN)
REAL
San Francisco ghostwriter Ruth Young finally begins to understand her Alzheimer's-afflicted mother LuLing's preoccupation with ghosts and curses when she reads Luling's writings of her dark backwoods childhood in 1920s China--where LuLing's mute, disfigured nursemaid committed suicide, and a nearby cave held what may have been the bones of the lost ancient
hominid Peking Man.
Chinese Cinderella: the True Story of an Unwanted Daughter by Adeline Yen Mah (B MAH) BIOGRAPHY
The author tells the story of her painful childhood in China where she lived until the age of fourteen with her father,
stepmother, and siblings, all of whom considered her bad luck because her mother died shortly after giving birth to her.
Double Luck: Memoirs of a Chinese Orphan
by Chi Fa Lu (B LU) BIOGRAPHY
Tells the story of the author's struggles after being orphaned at the age of three and how he held on to his dream of coming to the United States as he passed from one relative to another and was even sold to a Communist couple.
American Goddess at the Rape of Nanking: the Courage of Minnie Vautrin by Hua-ling Hu (B VAU)
BIOGRAPHY
A biography of American missionary Minnie Vautrin, based on diaries she kept between 1919 and 1941, focusing on the heroic measures she took to protect ten thousand Chinese women and children from the marauding Japanese army during the Sino-Japanese War, and discussing her efforts to help the refugees after the siege of Nanking.
Growing Up Asian American: an Anthology
(810.8 GRO)
A collection of writings by Asian-American authors sharing what it was like to grow up in America.
The Journal of Wong Ming-Chung: a Chinese Miner
by Laurence Yep (FIC YEP) HISTORICAL
A young Chinese boy nicknamed Runt records his experiences in a journal as he travels from southern China to California in 1852 to join his uncle during the Gold Rush.
The Fold by An Na (FIC NA) REALISTIC
Joyce Park, a high school junior who is always compared to her beautiful and talented older sister, Helen, wants to attract the attention of John Ford Kang, and wrestles with whether to get plastic surgery as a gift from her aunt.
*Also try ANY other books by An Na!
Good Enough by Paula Yoo (FIC YOO) HUMOR
A Korean American teenager tries to please her parents by getting into an Ivy League college, but a new guy in school and her love of the violin tempt her in new directions.
When My Name Was Keoko
by Linda Sue Park (FIC PAR) HISTORICAL
With national pride and occasional fear, a brother and sister face the increasingly oppressive occupation of Korea by Japan during World War II, which threatens to suppress Korean culture entirely.