Outside Beauty by Cynthia Kadohata [in Bloomsbury Review]
01 Nov, by in Fiction, Japanese American, Middle Grade Readers, Pan-Asian Pacific American, Repost, Young Adult Readers
Helen Kimura has survived and thrived by using her irresistable beauty to get exactly what she wants. Steely and independent, she's never succumbed to anyone else's expectations but her own. Her four daughters by four different...
Ethnic chick-lit favorite 
For years, 13-year-old Korean adoptee Lauren has endured the usual racial taunts for looking so different amidst her homogeneous fellow students in suburban Connecticut. Her popular and fearless best friend has done a far better job...
After he swears off girls forever, loner – some might even call him a loser – Albert Kim finds first love over the summer after sophomore year ...
High school senior Patti Yoon, the perfect Korean American daughter studying for her perfect SAT scores, perfectly playing the violin, aiming for HYP (KorEnglish for HarvardYalePrinceton), and (of course!) never talking to boys, discovers her feisty...
Thank goodness the Pulitzer-winning Jhumpa Lahiri went back to her short story roots: The Namesake was okay, but disappointing after The Interpreter of Maladies which was such a shockingly remarkable debut.
Holy moly, now comes this unforgettable...
"When I got to college I said I was adopted, right off the bat,” says Todd Knowlton, a 33-year-old Korean-American adoptee. “It doesn’t bother me, but once they hear my last name, people always ask uncomfortable...
You can't believe how scary this book can be, especially if you have children of your own. The eponymous boy of many names in 
At 32, Anita Jain is an object of pity. Never mind her Harvard degree and a journalism career with its expat adventures in far-flung destinations such as London, Mexico City, and Singapore. Ask any auntie or...
Rosie has a near-perfect life, even an adorable little sister. But as Buttercup gets older, Rosie sometimes finds it challenging to get along with her. One day she takes her sister to their neighbor, offering her...
IF YOU READ ONE BOOK, LET IT BE THIS EPIC STUNNER! One rainy evening, an elderly gentleman finds himself opening the door to his past in the form an elderly woman who arrives bearing a gift....
Here’s the best news up front: 
Marked with a “Parental Advisory,” this is not your regular kiddie fare. Imprisoned in darkness since birth, Ral and his powerful shadow dragon, Grad, who shares Ral’s very being, are finally released at age 15 to...
India in the 1940s is a time of tumultuous violence – the British troops are subduing independence efforts, citizens of different religious backgrounds are fighting each other, World War II is raging in Europe, and the...
I confess: I’m a Muth addict, even though technically my kids are too old for his picture books. But really, his books are ageless and we can all learn some major life lessons from them. Zen...
First published in 1983, Sidhwa’s haunting first novel has been brought back with a new introduction by grand dame Anita Desai. It's based on a true story Sidwha heard while traveling in Pakistan about a young...
When the brutal dictator Idi Amin violently grabbed power over Uganda, he declared in August 1972, that within 90 days all Indians would have to leave the country. Part of Uganda’s population since the 16th century,...