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🌸📚 Happy Asian Heritage Month! 📚🌸
May is Asian Heritage Month! What better way to celebrate than by diving into some great reads that will give you a feel and the people and the culture?
The actual definition of “Asian” is quite broad and generally applies to people who come from or whose ancestors come from East Asia, South Asia, Central Asia, South East Asia, and Western Asia. And of course, you might be thinking that’s quite a lot of people and definitely a whole lot of different cultures. From China and Hong Kong to Cambodia and Qatar, so OF COURSE, this list is not all inclusive of every single area, just some of the books I’ve liked so I can recommend.
From heartwarming stories to thrilling adventures, these books will broaden your horizons and give you a glimpse into the rich tapestry of Asian cultures.
How to Pronounce Knife by Souvankham Thammavongsa (Canadian writer):
In the title story of Souvankham Thammavongsa’s debut collection, a young girl brings a book home from school and asks her father to help her pronounce a tricky word, a simple exchange with unforgettable consequences. Thammavongsa is a master at homing in on moments like this — moments of exposure, dislocation, and messy feeling that push us right up against the limits of language.
The stories that make up How to Pronounce Knife focus on characters struggling to find their bearings in unfamiliar territory, or shuttling between idioms, cultures, and values. A failed boxer discovers what it truly means to be a champion when he starts painting nails at his sister’s salon. A young woman tries to discern the invisible but immutable social hierarchies at a chicken processing plant. A mother coaches her daughter in the challenging art of worm harvesting.
A History of Burning by Janika Oza (Canadian writer):
An epic, sweeping historical debut novel spanning continents and a century, and how one act of survival can reverberate through generations.
At the turn of the twentieth century, Pirbhai, a teenage boy looking for work, is taken from his village in India to labor on the East African Railway for the British. One day Pirbhai commits an act to ensure his survival that will haunt him forever and reverberate across his family’s future for years to come.
The Marvelous Mirza Girls by Sheba Karim:
To cure her post–senior year slump, made worse by the loss of her aunt Sonia, Noreen is ready to follow her mom on a gap year trip to New Delhi, hoping India can lessen her grief and bring her voice back.
In the world’s most polluted city, Noreen soon meets kind, handsome Kabir, who introduces her to the wonders of this magical, complicated place. With Kabir’s help—plus Bollywood celebrities, fourteenth-century ruins, karaoke parties, and Sufi saints—Noreen begins to rediscover her joyful voice.
Daughters of the Dawn by Sasha & Sarena Nanua:
Twin princesses Ria and Rani journey deep into dangerous new lands to save their home in this propulsive, immersive sequel to Sisters of the Snake, perfect for fans of We Hunt the Flame and The Wrath & the Dawn. The powerful Bloodstone is in dangerous hands. And a deadly new threat rises. Ria and Rani have barely settled into their new lives at the palace—as princesses, as sisters—when a sinister prophecy uproots them once more.
While You Were Dreaming by Alisha Rai:
Author Alisha Rai tackles undocumented immigration against the backdrop of viral online fame, fake dating, and a love triangle.
If Sonia Patil had her way, she’d be attending her local comic con instead of covering a shift for her boss’s daughter. Since Sonia’s mom was deported and her sister, who never claimed deferred status under DACA, had to forgo college to support them, Sonia’s had her hands full with work, school, and pretending everything is okay at home.
Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng:
A profoundly moving story of family, secrets, and longing, Everything I Never Told You is both a gripping page-turner and a sensitive family portrait, uncovering the ways in which mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, and husbands and wives struggle, all their lives, to understand one another.
Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls by T Kira Madden:
With unflinching honesty and lyrical prose, spanning from 1960s Hawai’i to the present-day struggle of a young woman mourning the loss of a father while unearthing truths that reframe her reality, Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls is equal parts eulogy and love letter. It’s a story about trauma and forgiveness, about families of blood and affinity, both lost and found, unmade and rebuilt, crooked and beautiful.
Your Driver is Waiting by Priya Guns:
A wild, one-sitting read brimming with dark comedy, and piercing social commentary and announcing Priya Guns’ feverishly original voice, Your Driver Is Waiting is a crackling send-up of our culture of modern alienation.
Damani is tired. Her father just died on the job at a fast food joint, and now she lives paycheck to paycheck in a basement, caring for her mom and driving for an app that is constantly cutting her take. The city is roiling in protests –everybody’s in solidarity with somebody– but while she keeps hearing that they’re fighting for change on behalf of people like her, she literally can’t afford to pay attention.
The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo:
Jordan Baker grows up in the most rarefied circles of 1920s American society—she has money, education, a killer golf handicap, and invitations to some of the most exclusive parties of the Jazz Age. She’s also queer, Asian, adopted, and treated as an exotic attraction by her peers, while the most important doors remain closed to her.
Nghi Vo’s debut novel The Chosen and the Beautiful reinvents this classic of the American canon as a coming-of-age story full of magic, mystery, and glittering excess, and introduces a major new literary voice.
Build Your House Around My Body by Violet Kupersmith
Part puzzle, part revenge tale, part ghost story, this book takes us from colonial mansions to ramshackle zoos, from sweaty nightclubs to the jostling seats of motorbikes, from ex-pat flats to sizzling back-alley street carts. Spanning more than fifty years of Vietnamese history and barreling toward an unforgettable conclusion, this is a time-traveling, heart-pounding, border-crossing fever dream of a novel that will haunt you long after the last page.
The Heart Principle by Helen Hoang
When violinist Anna Sun accidentally achieves career success with a viral YouTube video, she finds herself incapacitated and burned out from her attempts to replicate that moment. And when her longtime boyfriend announces he wants an open relationship before making a final commitment, a hurt and angry Anna decides that if he wants an open relationship, then she does, too. Translation: She’s going to embark on a string of one-night stands. The more unacceptable the men, the better.
These books surely deserve a spot on your reading list, so don’t miss out on these hidden gems during Asian Heritage Month.
book clubbook review
What do you think?