Parent/child relationship Archives - Page 2 of 101

To Strip the Flesh by Oto Toda, translated by Emily Balistrieri [in Booklist]

21 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Repost, Short Stories, Translation

Oto Toda’s first manga collection translated into English presents four short stories and seven “two-page manga” that range from poignant to gruesome, whimsical to surreal. The titular “To Strip the Flesh” is the most developed, about a YouTube star who butchers freshly-shot game on camera....

Ghost Music by An Yu [in Booklist]

19 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Repost

A thought-to-be-missing piano prodigy recalls an old friend who “used to quote [Oscar Wilde] a lot. He said to live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people only exist.” In An Yu’s follow-up to her lauded debut, Braised Pork (2020), also an atmospheric study in...

Twelve Percent Dread by Emily McGovern [in Booklist]

17 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, British, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Irish, Repost

Irish cartoonist Emily McGovern’s sophomore graphic novel slyly examines screen-dependent twentysomethings stumbling through London life. At 25, Katie still lacks steady employment (and income). She rents a small room with gender-fluid, not-working artist Nas in has-been actor Jeremy’s townhouse. Katie and Nas are ex-best friends who...

Edmund White’s A Boy’s Own Story: The Graphic Novel by Edmund White, adapted by Brian Alessandro and Michael Carroll, illustrated by Igor Karash [in Shelf Awareness]

16 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Nonethnic-specific, Repost

Edmund White, arguably the godfather of gay literature, has published dozens of lauded titles over the last half-century. His autobiographical trilogy of gay identity – A Boy's Own Story (1982), The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988), and The Farewell Symphony (1997) – remains a classic. With this volume, the...

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

14 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center 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...

Before Your Memory Fades [Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Book 3] by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, translated by Geoffrey Trousselot [in Booklist]

12 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Japanese, Short Stories, Translation

In the third installment of the internationally best-selling Before the Coffee Gets Cold series, some of the familiar crew from Tokyo’s Café Funiculi Funicula move to Hakodate’s Café Donna Donna on Hokkaido after its proprietor, Yukari Tokita, leaves indefinitely for the U.S. to help a young...

Esther’s Notebooks by Riad Sattouf, translated by Sam Taylor [in Booklist]

11 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, European, French, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Nonfiction, Repost, Translation, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Riad Sattouf, renowned for his Arab of the Future autobiographical series, is just as famous in France for Esther’s Notebooks, which began as a weekly newspaper comic spotlighting the observations and experiences of a friend’s daughter. The comics’ popularity inspired best-selling books and an...

A Pros and Cons List for Strong Feelings by Will Betke-Brunswick [in Booklist]

09 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Will Betke-Brunswick alchemizes their beloved mother’s death into an affecting tribute to emotional resilience and everlasting love. For reasons not quite clear, Betke-Brunswick transforms their immediate quartet (two parents, two kids) into an adorable waddle of penguins, with extended family, friends, and acquaintances presented as...

The Earthspinner by Anuradha Roy [in Booklist]

30 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, British Asian, Fiction, Indian, Repost, South Asian

*STARRED REVIEW Sarayu (just Sara at her English university) has a scholarship so tight that she dreams of telling her benefactor how “an extra hundred pounds would make not the tiniest difference to his life but would transform [hers].” She finds comfort – not to mention...

Hakim’s Odyssey, Book 3: From Macedonia to France by Fabien Toulmé, translated by Hannah Chute [in Booklist]

29 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, European, French, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost, Syrian, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW French comics creator Fabien Toulmé’s stupendous trilogy concludes Hakim’s epic three-year odyssey from war-torn Syria to finally reaching safety in France. Hannah Chute returns to deftly translate the third volume. To remind audiences of previous events – though reading in order is a gratifying must...

The Sense of Wonder by Matthew Salesses [in Shelf Awareness]

28 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean American, Repost

PEN/Faulkner finalist Matthew Salesses, a transracial Korean adoptee, again distills his own experiences with race and (e)masculinity for laudable literary inspiration in The Sense of Wonder. His intricate novel spotlights three basketball players at different points of their careers – starting out, at the pinnacle,...

Any Other Family by Eleanor Brown [in Booklist]

26 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Eleanor Brown’s (The Weird Sisters) latest is certainly good, focusing on a “Very Special Family” of four siblings and their three sets of adoptive parents committed to keeping the children together through Sunday dinners, holidays, and now an all-family, two-week vacation. And here’s where...

Always Never by Jordi Lafebre, translated by Montana Kane [in Booklist]

25 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, French, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW That this story starts with “CHAPTER 20” will likely make readers pause to wonder if an earlier volume might have been missed. But worry not, and read on. A half-dozen pages later shows “CHAPTER 19,” revealing the narrative is moving in reverse. For 37 years,...

Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout [in Booklist]

24 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Uncategorized

*STARRED REVIEW Kimberly Farr is clearly Elizabeth Strout’s chosen voice, now reading the fourth of the Amgash series featuring Lucy Barton. It’s March 2020. Lucy’s first husband William convinces her to leave New York City for Maine. “I did not know that one of my friends...

Kaleidoscope by Cecily Wong [in Booklist]

22 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center 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 Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center 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...

Death by Bubble Tea [L.A. Night Market Mystery 1] by Jennifer J. Chow [in Booklist]

20 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Repost

Jennifer J. Chow inaugurates her L.A. Night Market Mysteries (after the Winston Wong and Sassy Cat/Mimi Lee series), which turns two cousins into unlikely sleuths. Yale Yee is still mourning her mother’s death. She quit her family’s dim sum restaurant and found solace in a...

The Emma Project [The Rajes series, Book 4] by Sonali Dev [in Booklist]

17 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Indian American, Repost, South Asian American

Sonali Dev concludes her Jane Austen-inspired Rajes series, narrated once more by Soneela Nankani, who ensures familiar continuity throughout the quartet. Interestingly, as if Emma wasn’t mainstream enough, Dev includes a snarky summary early on: “Emma is an overindulged, albeit well-meaning, brat who is looking for...

Ghost Town by Kevin Chen, translated by Darryl Sterk [in Shelf Awareness]

16 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Repost, Taiwanese, Translation

Former actor turned award-winning writer Kevin Chen's Ghost Town is certainly cinematic, populated with unforgettable characters – living, dead, and in between. Welcome to Yongjing, "a rural backwater in central Taiwan," just as Ghost Month looms. The Chen clan is about to experience an unexpected reunion,...

Gunk Baby by Jamie Marina Lau [in Shelf Awareness]

14 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Australian, Australian Asian, Fiction, Repost

Melbourne author Jamie Marina Lau was the same age as her 24-year-old protagonist when Gunk Baby, her second novel, was published in Australia in 2021. Following the success of Lau's 2018 debut, Pink Mountain on Locust Island, which was shortlisted for Australia's Stella Prize, Gunk Baby arrives Stateside...

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