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

By Coll Rowe | April 3 2025 | 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.

A Refugee Mother, an American Daughter
9781984878182
A dual first-person memoir by the acclaimed Vietnamese-American novelist and her thoroughly American teenage daughter.
$18.00 US
Sep 14, 2021
Paperback
320 Pages
Penguin Books

How I Stopped Being a Model Minority
9780593316825
The most personal writing yet to come from a noted scholar of race: a bold and moving look at race, gender, aging, and immigration that examines, through lenses both intimate and political, what it means to be an Asian American woman living in America today.
$27.00 US
Sep 10, 2024
Hardcover
304 Pages
Pantheon

Fifty Years of Photographic Justice
9780593580127
A collection of over 200 breathtaking photos celebrating the history and cultural impact of the Asian American social justice movement, from a beloved photographer who sought to change the world, one photograph at a time.
$50.00 US
Apr 09, 2024
Hardcover
320 Pages
Clarkson Potter

9781603094504

A stunning graphic memoir recounting actor/author/activist George Takei’s childhood imprisoned within American concentration camps during World War II.

$19.99 US
Jul 16, 2019
Paperback
208 Pages
Top Shelf Productions

The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong
9780593183984
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

A Novel
9780593685143

From the award-winning author of Goodbye, Vitamin: How far would you go to shape your own destiny? An exhilarating novel of American identity that spans three generations in one family and asks: What makes us who we are? And how inevitable are our futures?

$20.00 US
Mar 25, 2025
Paperback
416 Pages
Vintage

An Asian American Reckoning
9781984820389
Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong fearlessly and provocatively blends memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose fresh truths about racialized consciousness in America.
$20.00 US
Mar 02, 2021
Paperback
224 Pages
One World

9780807012710

An inclusive and landmark history, emphasizing how essential Asian American experiences are to any understanding of US history.

$18.95 US
Apr 25, 2023
Paperback
240 Pages
Beacon Press

9780143133285

The collective voice of Japanese Americans defined by a specific moment in time: the four years of World War II during which the US government expelled resident aliens and its own citizens from their homes and imprisoned 125,000 of them in American concentration camps, based solely upon the race they shared with a wartime enemy.

$20.00 US
May 14, 2024
Paperback
336 Pages
Penguin Classics

A Memoir
9780385547772
Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Autobiography
$27.00 US
Sep 27, 2022
Hardcover
208 Pages
Doubleday

A Graphic Memoir of Family, Community, and the Fight for Environmental Justice
9781984862495
A moving graphic memoir following Eddie Ahn, an environmental justice lawyer and activist striving to serve diverse communities in San Francisco amidst environmental catastrophes, an accelerating tide of racial and economic inequality, burnout, and his family’s expectations.
$24.99 US
Apr 16, 2024
Hardcover
208 Pages
Ten Speed Graphic

A Memoir of Love and Labor
9781646221523
A young girl forced to work in a Queens sweatshop calls child services on her mother in this powerful debut memoir about labor and self-worth that traces a Chinese immigrant's journey to an American future.
$16.95 US
Aug 02, 2022
Paperback
224 Pages
Catapult

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