Bunker 13
By Aniruddha Bahal (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
A testosterone-driven adventure about a journalist with a military past who has a heyday tracking down drug smugglers, guerrillas, mobsters and nuclear missiles.
Underkill: An Allen Choice Novel
By Leonard Chang (Thomas Dunne Books / St. Martin’s Press)
Introduced in Chang’s Over the Shoulder, Korean American Allen Choice — a licensed bodyguard but not yet a private investigator — returns in this second installment to figure out the facts about the sudden, suspicious death of his girlfriend’s brother.
Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America
By Firoozeh Dumas (Villard)
An especially timely, highly entertaining look — “I-ran is a sentence, Iran is a country” — at life in Southern California as an Iranian immigrant. Dumas mixes humorous misadventures with chilling memories of racism and loss.
The Girl with the White Flag
By Tomiko Higa (Kodansha)
First trade paperback edition of the harrowing memoir of a 6-year-old child who becomes separated from her family in the last days of World War II in Okinawa, Japan and somehow manages to survive alone.
Ashes
By Kenzo Kitakata, translated by Emi Shimokawa (Vertical)
A middle-aged yakuza who probably should have been “The Boss” but has stalled somewhere tries to figure out how to get out of the fray and quietly manipulate his way to the top.
The Mango Season
By Amulya Malladi (Ballantine)
A young woman returns to her home in India after a seven-year absence and has a difficult time telling her family about her non-Indian fiancé. The story is an otherwise entertaining light read about an extended family with dysfunctions that most APAs will recognize, but is ultimately marred by too many tedious, annoying references to the mixed union. We all either have parents or know parents who would keel over if we married “out,” but repetition of the fact does not necessarily make for good literature.
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books
By Azar Nafisi (Random House)
For two years before she left Iran, Nafisi, a resigned university professor, spent almost every Thursday morning with seven of her favorite female former students, discussing Western classics in a secret book group. Nafisi draws a parallel between the young Lolita, who is coerced, denied and ultimately overtaken by the oafish Humbert and the experience of Iranian women under the totalitarian regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Ring
By Koji Suzuki, translated by Robert B. Rohmer and Glynne Walley (Vertical)
The book that inspired both the Japanese cult film, Ringu, and the recent American remake, The Ring. With its bright pink and white cover, it’s a major eye-catcher. Start reading and it’s so creepy, your hair will literally stand on end, but you still won’t be able to put it down. Not having seen either film (why have someone else create your nightmares?), the book was plenty to turn a few hairs grey.
The Laws of Evening: Stories
By Mary Yukari Waters
(Scribner)
Debut collection of breathtaking, breathless stories by a half Japanese, half Irish American writer who seems to be searching for meaning in the spaces between war and peace, between being Japanese and becoming American, between love and loneliness.
Once Removed
By Mako Yoshikawa (Bantam)
In alternating voices, this lyrical novel captures the relationship between two stepsisters — one a Japanese American, the other a blond Jewish-Catholic — who are so different and yet so alike, proving that some of the deepest family bonds are not defined by blood.
And for the kiddies …
Goldfish and Chrysanthemums
By Andrea Cheng, illustrated by Michelle Chang (Lee & Low)
A touching story about a young girl who builds her grandmother a small goldfish pond surrounded by chrysanthemums, in response to a letter from China announcing that the grandmother’s childhood home has been torn down.
Everything is Different at Nonna’s House
By Caron Lee Cohen, illustrated by Hiroe Nakata (Clarion)
Delightful story about a little city boy who goes to visit his grandmother out in the country.
Butterflies for Kiri
By Cathryn Falwell (Lee & Low)
Kiri receives an origami set from her aunt for her birthday and is disappointed when she cannot make the perfect origami butterfly. Undaunted, she continues to practice until she creates a lovely collage, complete with one perfect yellow butterfly.
B is for Bulldozer: A Construction ABC
By June Sobel, illustrated by Melissa Iwai (Harcourt)
A delightful romp pointing out the A-B-Cs found in an active construction site, from Asphalt to Z-o-o-m!