13 Books for Kids that Celebrate
All Things Asian
by Laura Lambert
Even though I grew up eating kimchi and saying ko-map-sup-ni-da, the only “Asian” book I read as a child was Tikki Tikki Tembo. It was a favorite of mine, but looking back, I’m not sure that I learned much about Asian culture. People even argue whether the folktale is Chinese or Japanese.
My two kids also love the breathless tongue twister of Tikki’s full name. But I’m happy to report that thirty-some years later, there are some truly great books about the various Asian cultures — almost all with a focus on family and food. (But mostly food.)
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Beginner Books
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Bee-bim Bop
If you believe, as I do, that culture begins and ends in the stomach, you’ll know why nothing is more comforting to me than a big bowl of bi bim bap, a traditional Korean rice bowl with veggies, often meat, and a fried egg on top. This sweet little rhyming book celebrates making this humble dish with mama — recipe included. Author Linda Sue Park also wrote the Newberry Award-winning book A Single Shard, a middle-grade book about an orphan boy in 12th century Korea.
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Dim Sum for Everyone!
Available from:Again with the food? Yes, because who doesn’t love dim sum? This book features the à la carte yumminess that is the Chinese dim sum tradition and highlights a key Asian cultural tradition — eating together.
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Yoko
Yoko, the first in a series by beloved children’s book author Rosemary Wells, offers another sweet lesson about diversity through the lens of food. Yoko’s favorite lunch is sushi, but her classmates aren’t so sure about it — in fact, they think it’s pretty gross. For a lot of modern kids, sushi isn’t so very exotic. But it still serves as a jumping off point for a lesson about cultural differences. Later in the series, Yoko and her Japanese mother learn to read and fly to Japan!
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Early Readers
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Dear Juno
Available from:I was an English-speaking toddler cared for by a grandmother who spoke only Korean, so I know well how two people who love each other can surpass whatever intergenerational, cross-cultural hurdles there may be to communicate. Juno’s grandmother writes in Korean; Juno sends pictures — and they understand each other just fine.
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Hot, Hot Roti for Dada-ji
Another food-focused trip, through India this time. Hot, Hot Roti for Dada-ji won the 2012 Asian Pacific American Award for Literature Honor for Picture Books and the Best Children's Books of the Year Bank Street College of Education for it’s depiction of Aneel and his grandparents, visiting from India and full of wondrous tales, powered by roti! Recipe included.
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The Name Jar
Available from:My daughter is only one-quarter Korean, but we share the same Korean middle name, and there’s something about the plight of little Unhei, the new Korean-from-Korea kid in class, that speaks to her. Unhei is so shy about people pronouncing her names that she claims she doesn’t yet have one. As her fellow classmates fill a name jar with ideas, Unhei comes to embrace what’s uniquely hers.
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Zen Shorts
Zen Shorts is a Caldecott Honor Book that spent 41 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list — that alone says a lot. In it, author John Muth uses a panda named Stillwater to tell, in an accessible way, three ancient Zen tales meant to get us thinking about Big Ideas, like forgiveness, good and evil, and the price of anger. Even kids who miss the deeper messages will adore the illustration and storytelling. Muth followed this with a companion book, Zen Ties.
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Wabi Sabi
“Am I beautiful or ordinary?” asks Wabi Sabi, a brown cat from Kyoto who embarks on a journey to understand her name. The answer, she finds, is both — like the Japanese word for which she is named, which celebrates the beauty in what is simple, imperfect, and modest. This beautifully constructed book is laid out so that you flip pages bottom-to-top instead of left-to-right, which, in itself, is oddly lovely. It was the New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book for 2008 and an Asian Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA) Picture Book winner that same year.
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Middle Grade Readers
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The Great Wall of Lucy Wu
In this APALA award-winning Chinese-American coming-of-age tale, Lucy Wu is a sixth-grader who loves basketball and just wants a room of her own. Her big plans are foiled when her aunt comes from China, and the lesson is that what looks like good or bad luck at first often turns out to be just the opposite.
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In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson
When 10-year-old Bandit learns she’s moving from China to New York to be with family, she renames herself Shirley Temple Wong. The year is 1947 — the same year Jackie Robinson breaks the color barrier in American baseball. In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, an American Library Association Notable Children’s Book, uses humor to diffuse the classic immigrant tale of the outsider slowly learning to become an American.
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Where the Mountain Meets the Moon
In this Newberry Award-winning book, Lin embraces the tradition of the Chinese folk tale and leavens it with a bit of fantasy. Where the Mountain Meets the Moon is about an adventurous young heroine named Minli, who sets out to change her family’s fortune. Lin calls it her Chinese “Wizard of Oz.”
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The Year of the Dog
This is the first novel from the ever-prolific Grace Lin. As the title states, it is the year of the dog, and Grace Lin, a young Taiwanese American girl who also goes by “Pacy,” must find her true self. She finds a new best friend, who shares her cultural heritage, and with their adventures together comes a lot of self-discovery. A second novel, The Year of the Rat, came out in 2008.
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Ichiro
For the slightly older, more mature reader, Ichiro is a graphic novel about the nature of war. After his American father is killed in the Iraq War, Ichiro and his Japanese mother move back to Japan to join her father. The illustrations and storytelling combine modern, ancient, and fantasy-like elements into one visually arresting tale.
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So, clearly, this list doesn’t quite cover all things Asian. There are countries we didn’t cover — and cuisines! Which of your favorite Asian books are missing from the list?