Books for Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander Heritage Month

By Coll Rowe | April 10 2024 | LiteratureHistorySociology

Every May we celebrate the rich history and culture of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. Browse a curated selection of fiction and nonfiction books by AANHPI creators that we think your students will love. Find our full collection of titles for Higher Education here.

Crying in H Mart
A Memoir
978-1-9848-9895-1
In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up one of the few Asian American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother's particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother’s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.
$17.00 US
Mar 28, 2023
Paperback
256 Pages
Vintage

Mott Street
A Chinese American Family's Story of Exclusion and Homecoming
978-0-525-55739-5
From the winner of the M.F.K. Fisher Book Prize and a New York Public Library Cullman fellow comes a sweeping narrative history of the Chinese Exclusion Act through an intimate portrayal of one family’s epic journey to lay down roots in America.
$18.00 US
Apr 23, 2024
Paperback
400 Pages
Penguin Books

They Called Us Exceptional
And Other Lies That Raised Us
978-0-593-44298-2
An Indian American daughter reveals how the dangerous model minority myth tears families apart and wrecks mental health in this searing, brave memoir.
$28.00 US
Aug 22, 2023
Hardcover
288 Pages
Crown

The Chinese Groove
A Novel
978-1-64009-618-9
Anne Tyler meets Jade Chang in this buoyant, good-hearted, and sharply written novel about a blithely optimistic immigrant with big dreams, dire prospects, and a fractured extended family in need of his help—even if they don’t know it yet.
$17.95 US
Jan 23, 2024
Paperback
304 Pages
Counterpoint

Year of the Tiger
An Activist's Life
978-0-593-31539-2

From the founder and director of the Disability Visibility Project, and the editor of the acclaimed anthology Disability Visibility, this groundbreaking memoir in essays offers a glimpse into an activist’s journey to finding and cultivating community and the continued fight for disability justice.

$17.00 US
Sep 06, 2022
Paperback
400 Pages
Vintage

Not Your China Doll
The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong
978-0-593-18398-4
Set against the glittering backdrop of Los Angeles in the gin-soaked Jazz Age and the rise of Hollywood, this debut book celebrates Anna May Wong, the first Asian American movie star, to bring an unsung heroine to light to reclaim her place in cinema history.
$32.00 US
Mar 12, 2024
Hardcover
480 Pages
Dutton

Minor Feelings
An Asian American Reckoning
978-1-9848-2038-9
Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong fearlessly and provocatively blends memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose fresh truths about racialized consciousness in America. Part memoir and part cultural criticism, this collection is vulnerable, humorous, and provocative—and its relentless and riveting pursuit of vital questions around family and friendship, art and politics, identity and individuality, will change the way you think about our world.
$18.00 US
Mar 02, 2021
Paperback
224 Pages
One World

They Called Us Enemy
978-1-60309-450-4
A stunning graphic memoir recounting actor/author/activist George Takei’s childhood imprisoned within American concentration camps during World War II. Experience the forces that shaped an American icon—and America itself—in this gripping tale of courage, country, loyalty, and love.
$19.99 US
Jul 16, 2019
Paperback
208 Pages
Top Shelf Productions