BookDragon Author Interview/Profile

Prophecy [Book 1 of Prophecy Series] by Ellen Oh + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

07 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, Young Adult Readers

As the mother of three young girls, Ellen Oh is constantly on the lookout for good books that showcase female empowerment. She's found a few here and there – say, The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins, The Girl of Fire and Thorns trilogy by Rae Carson, The Hero and the...

Publisher Interview: Sunyoung Lee and Kaya Press [in Bookslut]

03 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Chinese American, Fiction, Japanese American, Korean American, Pan-Asian, Pan-Asian Pacific American, Poetry, Repost, Translation

Early this year, at almost 18 years old, Kaya Press flew the nest. Leaving behind the comfort and familiarity of New York's publishing world, the non-profit indie specializing in "books from the Asian diaspora," moved offices across the country to Los Angeles. Now comfortably ensconced...

The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

04 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Japanese, Malaysian, Repost, Southeast Asian

I can count on one hand the books that I've given by the dozens to lucky relatives and friends over the decades. One of those counting fingers belongs to Tan Twan Eng's debut stunner, The Gift of Rain. With the impending American release this month of...

The Collective by Don Lee + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

02 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Korean American, Repost

Don Lee is definitely a good news-bad news sort of guy, albeit all in the same breath. Good news: he's not going to Texas this summer, because his fourth and latest book, The Collective, is published this month and he's going on a book tour so...

One Red Bastard by Ed Lin + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

07 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Chinese American, Fiction, Repost

Ed Lin is not Robert Chow, his fictional alter ego who has starred in three of Lin's four books. If nothing else, Lin is just too young, too happy, and too funny to resemble the Vietnam War veteran-turned Chinatown, New York City cop. The other...

Beneath the Lion’s Gaze by Maaza Mengiste + Author Interview

09 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, African, Author Interview/Profile, Black/African American, Fiction

Maaza Mengiste's voice, delivered by telephone many thousands of miles away, sounds impossibly young and happy. She’s easy to talk to, easy to laugh with. She’s in Rome for another few months, enjoying the spring sun, sipping another cup of tea in a nearby café,...

The World We Found by Thrity Umrigar + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

03 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Indian American, Repost, South Asian American

Here's a moment of literary serendipity: on the morning my Bookslut interview with Luis Alberto Urrea went up, I happened to be finishing the galley of Thrity Umrigar’s latest novel, The World We Found. Amazingly, here's what appears in the penultimate paragraph on the very...

Author Interview: Ha Jin [in Bookslut]

03 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Chinese, Chinese American, Fiction, Repost, Short Stories

Ha Jin has lived through difficult, defining events: the Cultural Revolution in his native China, military service that began when he was a young teenager, immigration and subsequent separation from home and family. On the page, he has vividly reproduced the repression of the Cultural...

Toxicology by Jessica Hagedorn + Author Interview [in Our Own Voice]

27 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American

Eight years have passed (far too quickly) since I last saw the inimitable Jessica Hagedorn. Her 2003 novel, Dream Jungle, was about to come out and we were in desperate search of boba tea in New York’s East Village. Faced with a closed tea salon...

Author Interview: Jessica Hagedorn [in Bookslut]

05 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Repost

When I first met the inimitable Jessica Hagedorn eight years ago – her 2003 novel Dream Jungle, in which Hagedorn intertwines the alleged discovery of an ancient "lost tribe" in the remote hills of the Philippines with the problematic filming of Apocalypse Now, was just...

Author/Artist Interview: CYJO + “KYOPO”

08 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Korean, Korean American, Nonfiction, Young Adult Readers

CYJO + “KYOPO” = MARVEL Come one, come all! Get ready for the upcoming Asian Pacific American invasion at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. “Portraiture Now: Asian American Portraits of Encounter” opens this Thursday, August 12 and runs through October 14, 2012. Presented in conjunction with the...

Author Interview: Tahmima Anam [in Bookslut]

01 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Bangladeshi, Bangladeshi American, British Asian, Fiction, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American

In spite of the fierce, wrenching content of her books, Tahmima Anam in real life is a gentle, warm, incredibly youthful presence. We met in livetime a few years ago in Washington, DC, as her debut novel, A Golden Age, was winning major international awards,...

Author Interview: Jenny Han [in Bookslut]

02 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Korean American, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, Young Adult Readers

In case you were unsure, that’s Jenny Han as in “Han Solo,” not Han as in “hand.” Befitting of the bestselling young adult author that she is, she can recite all the dialogue from the cult film Clueless, and she gladly admits her adoration for...

First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers by Loung Ung + Author Interview

10 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Cambodian, Cambodian American, Memoir, Nonfiction, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American

For someone who has experienced hell, Loung Ung is a bright, welcoming voice filled with inviting laughter. She’s warm: “I just had dinner with my writing group last night. They’re my PenGals. I just love them! I don’t know what I would do without them.” She’s practical:...

Author Interview: Xinran [in Bookslut]

07 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, British Asian, Chinese, Nonfiction, Repost, Translation

People, even complete strangers, feel compelled to tell Xinran their personal stories, from the simple happiness of sweet everyday lives to the most horrific memories of shocking abuse. Something in her soothing voice, the wordless encouragement to keep talking, exudes a sense of undeniable comfort...

Author Interview: Anjali Banerjee [in Bookslut]

06 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Indian American, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, South Asian American

With her past seven published novels – written for audiences that range from middle-grade readers on up – Anjali Banerjee didn’t particularly mention male body parts in any great detail. Maybe a twinkling eye here, capable hands there, but she certainly didn’t dwell. But as...

Author Interview: Audrey Niffenegger [in Bookslut]

03 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, British, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Nonethnic-specific, Repost

Sometimes jet lag has its advantages. Amazingly enough, I caught Audrey Niffenegger soon after her London arrival, when she wasn’t sleeping – “I am very bad at jet lag,” she confesses....

Author Interview: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni [in Bloomsbury Review]

10 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Indian American, Repost, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

Sharing Humanity: A Talk with Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni about Her Latest Novel, One Amazing Thing Over the last decades, tragedies – both human-made and those wrought by an ever-angry Mother Nature – seem to be coming at humankind with fast and furious regularity. The latest oil...

Author Interview: Grace Lin [in Bookslut]

02 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Author Interview/Profile, Children/Picture Books, Chinese American, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, Taiwanese American, Young Adult Readers

I really should have taken a picture: my too-fast growing tween son, cuddled in bed reading to his little cousin (my not-quite-5-year-old nephew with the most amazing eyes you’ll ever gaze into), hearing the very familiar words of Grace Lin’s delicious Dim Sum for Everyone. “Do...

Author Interview: Karen Tei Yamashita [in Bookslut]

06 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Japanese American, Pan-Asian Pacific American, Repost

For the last two months or so, Karen Tei Yamashita will not get out of my life. And I say that with a goofy-grinned "wahhh" of delighted surprise. While I’ve been an ardent admirer of Yamashita’s books for some 20 years (yup, I have all...