Nonfiction Archives - Page 19 of 56

Daughters of the Samurai: A Journey from East to West and Back by Janice P. Nimura [in Christian Science Monitor]

Daughters of the Samurai profiles three remarkable women who influenced modern Japanese history Set aside ample time: You won’t welcome intrusions while reading this unprecedented, true story featuring young Japanese girls who arrived stateside without language or cultural training, and matured into three of the most...

100 Crushes by Elisha Lim

01 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Nonfiction, Young Adult Readers

Olympian Bruce Jenner's April 24, 2015 interview with Diane Sawyer will likely be remembered as one of those critical moments for the LGBTQ community, especially those who identify as transgender. While every human being should be equally valued, Jenner's hugely public persona will create a more focused spotlight on...

How much do you know about French literature? [in Christian Science Monitor]

29 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, French, Lists, Nonfiction, Poetry, Repost, Translation

How much do you know about French literature? Try our quiz! From Anatole France to Émile Zola, French writers are among the most esteemed on the planet. But how well do you know la littérature française? Take our quiz and find out. Published: Christian Science Monitor, April...

What do you know about Asian literature? [in Christian Science Monitor]

27 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Lists, Nonfiction, Pan-Asian, Poetry, Repost, Translation

What do you know about Asian literature? So you love haiku, can quote from "The Art of War," and have read at least a couple of novels by Salman Rushdie. But do you know enough to ace our Asian lit quiz? Try it and see. Published: Christian...

A Kim Jong-Il Production: The Extraordinary True Story of a Kidnapped Filmmaker, His Star Actress, and a Young Dictator’s Rise to Power by Paul Fischer

13 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Korean, Nonfiction, North Korean

The more I read about North Korea, the more flabbergasted I become that THREE generations of Kim dictators have managed to shutter out most of the world for this long. So tragically epic or utterly preposterous – with little in between – are the limited...

Tomboy: A Graphic Memoir by Liz Prince

10 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Middle Grade Readers, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Young Adult Readers

By age 4, Liz Prince knew something important about herself: she could be "totally happy as long as [she] didn't have to wear a dress." Before you pass any judgments, Prince explains at age 31, "I look like a total tantrum-throwing brat, which I wasn't...

The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Tyrant Who Created North Korea and the Young Lieutenant Who Stole His Way to Freedom by Blaine Harden [in Christian Science Monitor]

19 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Korean, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, North Korean, Repost

'The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot' presents a riveting slice of North Korean history Writing one of the most difficult-to-read books ever – Escape from Camp 14 (2012), about a young man’s harrowing odyssey from North Korea where he was bred as a labor camp slave...

Somewhere Inside: One Sister’s Captivity in North Korea and the Other’s Fight to Bring Her Home by Laura Ling and Lisa Ling

17 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Chinese American, Korean, Korean American, Memoir, Nonfiction, North Korean

Headlines in 2009 put Laura Ling and Euna Lee on screens and print around the world. 'American journalists held captive in North Korea' was certainly not a common occurrence. While filming footage for a documentary on North Korean defectors in March 2009, three colleagues from...

The World Is Bigger Now: An American Journalist’s Release from Captivity in North Korea by Euna Lee with Lisa Dickey

16 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Korean American, Memoir, Nonfiction, North Korean

In 2009, journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling made headlines around the world, first for being kidnapped by North Korean border guards, then five months later being miraculously released. Such international reverberating news usually begets a book – in this case, two: both Lee and Ling released...

Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea’s Elite by Suki Kim

12 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Korean, Korean American, Memoir, Nonfiction, North Korean

Over a decade has passed since a Suki Kim title landed on my shelves. That she's been repeatedly crossing the "immutable border" into North Korea since 2002 – just months after George W. Bush dubbed the closed country as one of the "axis of evil"...

Take This Man: A Memoir by Brando Skyhorse

09 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Latina/o/x, Memoir, Native American/First Nations/Indigenous Peoples, Nonfiction

Well, of course, the year I'm mostly out of DC, Brando Skyhorse is the Jenny McKean Moore Writer-in-Residence at George Washington University. Not that I have any affiliation there now (only a leftover GWU ID from when I took a couple of classes 3.5 decades...

Dear Leader: Poet, Spy, Escapee – A Look Inside North Korea by Jang Jin-Sung, translated by Shirley Lee

05 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Korean, Memoir, Nonfiction, North Korean, Translation

While the majority of the nonfiction books about North Korea have focused on the extreme deprivation and unbearable suffering of the common citizen – for example, labor camps and slave children born to prisoners in Blaine Harden's Escape from Camp 14, numerous "ordinary lives" in Barbara Demick's...

Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande

02 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Indian American, Memoir, Nonfiction, South Asian American

Ah finally, I'm fully caught up with the good doc, having read each of Atul Gawande’s four bestsellers in published order. And how grateful am I to have followed through so methodically, because all that 'homework' certainly made this, his latest, an even fuller read. Here's...

Discontent and Its Civilizations: Dispatches from Lahore, New York, and London by Mohsin Hamid [in Christian Science Monitor]

26 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, British, British Asian, Memoir, Nonfiction, Pakistani, Repost, South Asian

'Civilization and its Discontents' highlights the intertwined Pakistani, British, and American roots of Mohsin Hamid Thanks to Haruki Murakami, we won't have to wait as long for Mohsin Hamid’s future novels. Hamid's acclaimed first two, Moth Smoke and The Reluctant Fundamentalist, took seven years each. His...

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande

11 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Indian American, Nonfiction, South Asian American

In order to give myself permission to read the latest bestseller by Rhodes Scholar/surgeon/professor/MacArthur “Genius”/New Yorker/TED-anointed Dr. Atul Gawande (and yes, all his books are lauded, importantly nominated, finalist-ed, awarded bestsellers), I decided I had to first finish his previous titles in order. What might sound a bit like unnecessary pressure just to...

The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus by Jen Bryant, illustrated by Melissa Sweet

10 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Biography, Children/Picture Books, European, Nonfiction

For someone who uses a thesaurus incessantly, I was shocked to realize how little I knew of Peter Mark Roget. The Right Word is just the right discovery! At age 8, Roget began writing his first book, simply titled Peter, Mark, Roget. His Book: "instead of writing stories,...

The Case for Loving: The Fight for Interracial Marriage by Selina Alko, illustrated by Sean Qualls and Selina Alko

27 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Black/African American, Children/Picture Books, Hapa/Mixed-race, Nonfiction

"First comes love. Then comes marriage." As pervasively common as that children's rhyme is, the legal union between two people has not always been – nor is it still – a right granted to all Americans. In 1967, Richard and Mildred Loving challenged the state of...

Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande

26 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Indian American, Memoir, Nonfiction, South Asian American

"This is a book about performance in medicine," Atul Gawande writes in the "Introduction" of his second bestselling title (he's got four total thus far – and counting!). "In medicine, as in any profession, we must grapple with systems, resources, circumstances, people – and our own...

Water Rolls, Water Rises | El agua rueda, el agua sube by Pat Mora, illustrated by Meilo So, translation by Adriana Domínguez & Pat Mora

21 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Bilingual, British Asian, Children/Picture Books, Latina/o/x, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translation

Ready for an around-the-world, invigorating, aquatic tour? Readers: get ready to be refreshed, guided by Pat Mora’s verses and Meilo So’s artistry...

The Lost Book of Mormon: A Journey Through the Mythic Lands of Nephi, Zarahemla, and Kansas City, Missouri by Avi Steinberg

20 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Jewish, Memoir, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction

In an attempt to better understand the unfamiliar territory in which I find myself domiciled through June 2016 (yes, I'm counting), I've been reading quite a few titles that hopefully will provide insight into the mindset of some of our would-be neighbors. Many of those books...

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