BookDragon BookDragon Tag

The Map that Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology by Simon Winchester

12 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, British, Nonfiction

Even prison did not stop William Smith from his tenacious decades-long journey to create a map that clearly captured in one colorful creation what was buried under England's rolling hills and valleys. Prison is where Simon Winchester, a remarkable chronicler of obscure and near-forgotten but terribly important lives...

Unpolished Gem: My Mother, My Grandmother, and Me by Alice Pung

08 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Australian, Australian Asian, Cambodian, Memoir, Nonfiction, Southeast Asian, Young Adult Readers

Already a many-time-many-variety award-winner in her native Australia, Alice Pung's debut memoir arrives Stateside filled with humor and bittersweet grace. Born one month after her family arrived in Melbourne, Australia, after fleeing the killing fields of Cambodia, Pung's father chooses her name for "a story...

Pluto: Urasawa x Tezuka 001 by Naoki Urasawa and Osamu Tezuka, co-authored by Takashi Nagasaki, supervised by Macoto Tezka

07 May, by SIBookDragon in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Translation, Young Adult Readers

Osamu Tezuka, the godfather of manga, introduced his beloved Tetsuwan Atom – better known in the West as Astro Boy – way back in 1951. The adorable robot boy became a worldwide phenomenon, thanks to his animated incarnation that began in 1963. Since then, somewhere, somehow,...

Ten Days and Nine Nights: An Adoption Story by Yumi Heo

07 May, by SIBookDragon in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Korean, Korean American

Here's a new perspective on the adoption experience: an older-sister-to-be marks off the days, one by one, as she and her father and grandparents make special preparations for the return of her mother who will be bringing her new sibling from Korea. Yumi Heo's illustrations...

32 Stories: The Complete Optic Nerve Mini-Comics by Adrian Tomine

05 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese American, Nonethnic-specific, Young Adult Readers

You've gotta love this boxed set of eight little mini-comic books. As a not-so-cool high school student (the first picture you see once you slide out the contents) who didn't have much of a social life, Adrian Tomine had quite the cool other-life, inking comics...

Silver Phoenix: Beyond the Kingdom of Xia by Cindy Pon

05 May, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese, Chinese American, Fiction, Young Adult Readers

Debut novelist Cindy Pon undoubtedly knows how to tell a story: Silver Phoenix is an exciting tale about a village teenager in ancient China who escapes a potential marriage with the over-wived town lech and goes on a great adventure through magical worlds to rescue her beloved...

Secret Keeper by Mitali Perkins

01 May, by SIBookDragon in Fiction, Indian, Indian American, Middle Grade Readers, South Asian, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

With their father unable to find a job in Delhi, Asha, her older sister Reet, and their mother must go live with relatives in Calcutta while her father travels to New York in search of new opportunities. He hopefully promises that reunion is not far...

Cashay by Margaret McMullan

29 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Black/African American, Fiction, Young Adult Readers

Walking home one day from school on the violent streets of Chicago, 14-year-old Cashay loses her beloved younger sister to a stray bullet. She would have done anything for her sister – she even purposefully flunked a grade so they could be in the same class. She...

Santa Claus in Baghdad and Other Stories about Teens in the Arab World by Elsa Marston

28 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Arab, Fiction, Iranian, Iraqi, Lebanese, Middle Eastern, Middle Grade Readers, Palestinian, Short Stories, Young Adult Readers

Eight stories feature eight teens from eight different countries coming of age during a time of uncertainty and tumult in their native Middle East countries. In the title story, young Amal of Baghdad, Iraq, must find the very best gift for her departing literature teacher even...

Once the Shore: Stories by Paul Yoon [in San Francisco Chronicle]

27 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Repost, Short Stories

I have to say it: ‘Yoon’ rhymes with ‘swoon’ for a reason! ...

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

24 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction

Who doesn't want to be happy? This so-called "modern classic" examines the different ways people can achieve "optimal experience" through a powerful combination of challenge, engagement, and an ultimate sense of accomplishment. Can't argue with that ...

Johnny Hiro {half asian, all hero} by Fred Chao, with greytones by Dylan Babb and letters and edits by Jesse Post

19 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese American, Young Adult Readers

The peaceful slumber of Johnny Hiro and girlfriend Mayumi Murakami in their rent-controlled (run-down) New York City apartment, is rudely interrupted by Gozadilla (that extra 'a' is not a typo), who couldn't make it as a killer monster in Tokyo so has come to New...

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell

19 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Audio, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction

So I'm getting on the Gladwell bandwagon a little late – and seemingly going backwards, too. Outliers floored me last month. And I'm hoping to get to The Tipping Point by next month. But timing is everything: I think I was meant to read Blink now because I have...

Ash by Malindo Lo

19 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Chinese American, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific, Young Adult Readers

The good news is you will probably find  Malindo Lo's young adult debut hard to put down. The bad news is that you will probably find it hard to find at all. At least for awhile ...

Atlas of Unknowns by Tania James

18 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Indian, Indian American, South Asian, South Asian American

Anju Melvin, used to being first in the classrooms of her hometown of Kumarakom in India's southern state of Kerala, wins herself a scholarship for a year aboard at an elite private high school in Manhattan. But what clinches the award is not her own...

Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer [in San Francisco Chronicle]

17 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, British, European, Fiction, Indian, Repost, South Asian

Geoff Dyer's latest novel, teasingly titled Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi, is quite the mind game. To play, you obviously have to read the book. Here's the initial setup: two distinct parts with a few overlapping similarities. In the first, "Jeff in Venice," London journalist...

In Defense of Our Neighbors: The Walt and Milly Woodward Story by Mary Woodward, foreword by David Guterson

15 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Japanese American, Nonfiction, Young Adult Readers

If such things are possible, this is actually (almost) a happy book about the Japanese American internment experience, as improbable as that sounds. Yes, the unfortunate Americans of Japanese descent who lived on Bainbridge Island in Puget Sound across from Seattle, Washington – who made up a...

Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie

13 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Afghan, British, British Asian, Fiction, Indian, Japanese, Pakistani, South Asian

Even though it's only April (and the book doesn't even hit stands until next month), I'm announcing with absolute certainty that Burnt Shadows gets my unwavering vote as THE Book of the Year. I'll only be too happy to eat my words because that can only mean...

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (vols. 1-2) by Nagaru Tanigawa, art by Gaku Tsugano, characters by Noizi Ito

11 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Translation, Young Adult Readers

Mystery solved: For awhile (way too long), Luddite me was maintaining our main Smithsonian APA Program website (no snickering!), and every time I booted up the machine I had to work on, an adorable anime character in a little sailor suit would pop up, pointing...

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa

11 Apr, by SIBookDragon in Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Translation, Young Adult Readers

In case you missed it ...