Hapa/Mixed-race Archives

The Last Karankawas by Kimberly Garza [in Booklist]

09 Jan, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Filipina/o American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Debut author Kimberly Garza skillfully links brilliantly crafted episodes to create an unforgettable community in Galveston, TX. The novel’s core belongs to Carly Castillo, abandoned by her father and Filipina immigrant mother and raised by grandmother Magdalena, who claims Texas’ vanished indigenous Karankawas as...

Top 10 Audiobooks of 2022 [in School Library Journal]

29 Dec, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Black/African American, Children/Picture Books, Chinese American, European, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Iranian American, Lists, Middle Grade Readers, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Persian American, Repost, Thai American, Young Adult Readers

Culled from the 200-plus titles with November 2021 to October 2022 publication dates I’ve reviewed or judged, this is SLJ’s list of top 10 audiobooks. Two picture books, a family history in verse, remade fairy tales, an intertwined podcast, and a haven’t-ever-heard-that-before double recording are...

Why Didn’t You Tell Me? by Carmen Rita Wong [in Booklist]

14 Dec, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Caribbean American, Chinese American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Latina/o/x, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost

“‘Your life is like a telenovela!’” Carmen Rita Wong’s daughter tells her after another complication in Wong’s labyrinthine search for her biological father. Born to Dominican immigrant mother Lupe, Wong and older brother Alex called Lupe’s estranged Chinese immigrant husband, Peter Wong, “Papi.” Lupe was a...

Kaleidoscope by Cecily Wong [in Booklist]

22 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Chinese American, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

Once upon a time, they seemed to be an ideal family: parents Hank and Karen Liu Brighton; their biracial daughters Morgan and Riley. They owned a small organic grocery store in Eugene, Oregon, then expanded into a globally sourced luxury goods empire called Kaleidoscope. First, Morgan...

Halina Filipina: A New Yorker in Manila by Arnold Arre [in Booklist]

21 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Filipina/o, Filipina/o American, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Indie publisher Tuttle showcases Filipino creator Arnold Arre, whose The Mythology Class (another Tuttle title) was the first comic to win the Philippine National Book Award. Renowned for his fantasy works, Arre describes Halina Filipina as a “no-frills relationship story” in an afterword describing the...

The Pachinko Parlor by Elisa Shua Dusapin, translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins [in Shelf Awareness]

07 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, French, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Winter in Sokcho, the extraordinary first novel, gorgeously translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins, by French Korean author Elisa Shua Dusapin, won the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature. The two reunite for The Pachinko Parlor, in which Dusapin's remarkably intricate and lean prose reveals...

They Call Her Fregona: A Border Kid’s Poems by David Bowles [in Shelf Awareness]

06 Nov, by SIBookDragon in Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Latina/o/x, Mexican American, Middle Grade Readers, Poetry, Repost, Verse Novel/Nonfiction, Young Adult Readers

David Bowles continues his eloquent, autobiographical narration of the "border kid" experience in They Call Her Fregona, a captivating novel-in-verse companion to his 2019 Pura Belpré Honor book, They Call Me Güero. Joanna Padilla, the titular fregona, is a "tough girl," first introduced in Güero. After Joanna saved Güero from...

The Lost Ryū by Emi Watanabe Cohen [in School Library Journal]

09 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese American, Jewish, Middle Grade Readers, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW A sigh of relief is almost immediate as Kurt Kanazawa effortlessly pronounces “ryū” – with exacting attention to that diacritical – then “Hiroshima” just so. The Julliard-trained actor displays his Japanese fluency, adroitly enhancing Emi Watanabe Cohen’s poignant first novel in which dragons –...

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin [in Booklist]

02 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Jewish, Korean American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

In her fifth adult title, Gabrielle Zevin (Young Jane Young, 2017) impressively interweaves multiple threads that twist and tangle around what is essentially a decades-long love story. Jennifer Kim ciphers most of the narration, deftly distinguishing the main three players, with a brief interlude voiced...

What We Fed to the Manticore by Talia Lakshmi Kolluri [in Booklist]

31 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian American

*STARRED REVIEW While novels told from an animal’s point of view are that unusual, an entire story collection with non-human narrators seems rare. Even more striking is the stupendous quality of Talia Lakshmi Kolluri’s breathtaking debut. Deep bonds define Kolluri’s heart-pulling protagonists, who too often face...

Beating Heart Baby by Lio Min [in Shelf Awareness]

11 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese American, Korean American, Latina/o/x, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Lio Min's soulful debut novel, Beating Heart Baby, highlights music, art, and the love of family – by birth, yes, but more significantly by circumstance and choice. Their emotive narrative spotlights Filipino American artist Santi and Korean Japanese American musician Suwa, playing out a tumultuous relationship...

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng [in Booklist]

01 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Bird is 12. Home is a 10th-floor dorm apartment without a working elevator. His Harvard professor father has been demoted to clerical duties at the library. Since his mother, Margaret, left three years ago, Bird is called Noah, anything to disassociate from her since she’s...

Take No Names by Daniel Nieh [in Shelf Awareness]

11 Jul, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

Daniel Nieh, a former international model and Chinese-English translator, introduced his protagonist Victor Li in the gripping Beijing Payback, published in 2019. Nieh's sophomore thriller, Take No Names, heightens the gasp-inducing wild ride of Victor's debut. Although both titles are easily consumable as stand-alone novels – Nieh...

Body Language: Writers on Identity, Physicality, and Making Space for Ourselves edited by Nicole Chung and Matt Ortile [in Booklist]

16 Jun, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Black/African American, Chinese American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese American, Latina/o/x, Memoir, Native American/First Nations/Indigenous Peoples, Nonfiction, Repost, Taiwanese American, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Editors Nicole Chung (All You Can Ever Know, 2018) and Matt Ortile (The Groom Will Keep His Name, 2020) present 30 essays that reveal how diverse bodies “move within (and against) expectations of race, gender, health, and ability.” Gabrielle Bellot, a Black trans woman,...

Nana, Nenek & Nina by Liza Ferneyhough [in Shelf Awareness]

15 Jun, by SIBookDragon in British, Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Malaysian American, Repost

Liza Ferneyhough makes her delightfully clever author/illustrator debut with Nana, Nenek & Nina. The picture book opens with a double-page spread introducing a three-person family, with the Golden Gate Bridge visible through their window. Photos hang on either side of the window, two of which...

The Good Asian (vol. 2) by Pornsak Pichetshote, illustrated by Alexandre Tefenkgi, colored by Lee Loughridge [in Booklist]

01 Jun, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, French, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost, Thai American, Vietnamese, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW To best appreciate this volume, readers must go back to the first book. Pornsak Pichetshote’s exquisite narration is an intricate temporal puzzle, his scenes moving between past and present, revealing just enough partial (scintillating, shocking, shrewd) backstory each time with many threads that require careful...

The Many Daughters of Afong Moy by Jamie Ford [in Booklist]

30 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

Jamie Ford (Love and Other Consolation Prizes, 2017) showcases “transgenerational epigenetic inheritance” – inheriting trauma through generations – in another multi-temporal narrative spanning two-and-a-half centuries across the globe. Ford deftly reveals seven women’s lives, beginning with progenitor Afong, “the first Chinese woman to set foot...

Cold by Mariko Tamaki [in Booklist]

18 May, by SIBookDragon in Audio, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

The recording begins with supposed-to-be-eerie tinkling notes. By the time they gratingly repeat 4.5 hours later, eyes might roll, ears could need clearing, and yet Mariko Tamaki’s dual-voiced thriller just might be immersive enough for listeners to overlook this uneven production. Katharine Chin opens as awkward...

When We Fell Apart by Soon Wiley [in Shelf Awareness]

02 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Hapa/Mixed-race, Korean American, Repost

Soon Wiley's searing debut, When We Fell Apart, deftly reveals in alternating chapters an abruptly truncated love story. Min Ford, a biracial Korean American, is a Samsung cultural specialist who has lived for three years in Seoul. Kim Yu-jin is in her final year at...

A Tiny Upward Shove by Melissa Chadburn [in Shelf Awareness]

28 Feb, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Black/African American, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost

Melissa Chadburn's electrifying debut novel, A Tiny Upward Shove, opens with gruesome death: "Dying hurts like f*ck-all everything." The description comes from "Aswang," a shape-shifting creature of Filipinx folklore, who knows "about the slow agonies of death" because she reanimates the body of 18-year-old Marina,...

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