For the Summer of 2021, I will be making my way through this list, revisiting great books I’ve read in the past by Asian-American authors, and will share my thoughts here and on Instagram (@karinafengcreative). My personal interests center around Chinese culture, gender, sexuality, intergenerational relationships, education, and immigration. My list is not comprehensive across cultures and perspectives, so I would greatly appreciate any suggestions as well! Feel free to follow along, comment your own perspectives, and leave recommendations!
The Summer 2021 Reading List and Additional Recommendations from the Past can be found at the end of this post. I will regularly update the post with reviews!
Currently Reading:
Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong
SUMMER 2021 READING LIST:
- Completed:
- The Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston
- The Refugees, Viet Thanh Nguyen
- Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri
- The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, Ken Liu
- Crying in H Mart, Michelle Zauner
- American Born Chinese, Gene Yang
- Interior Chinatown, Charles Yu
- Up Next:
- Pachinko, Min Jin Lee
- The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model Minority, Ellen Wu
- Ugly Feelings, Sianne Ngai
- You Lovely People, Bienvenido Santos
- Seventeen Syllables, Hisaye Yamamoto
- Deceit and Other Possibilities, Vanessa Hua
- The Long Afterlife of Nikkei Wartime Internment, Karen Inouye
- Romance and the Yellow Peril, Marchetti
- My Year Abroad, Chang-rae Lee
- Found, Souvankham Thammavongsa
- The Making of Asian America, Erika Lee
- Sansei and Sensibility, Karen Tei Yamashita
- Orientalism, Edward Said
- Ornamentalism, Anne Cheng
- Impossible Subjects, Mae Ngai
- Filipino Studies: Palimpsests of Nation and Diaspora
- Race and Resistance, Viet Thanh Nguyen
- Small Arguments, Souvankham Thammavongsa
- Seam, Tarfia Faizullah
- Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning, Cathy Park Hong
- On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong
- A Place for Us, Fatima Farheen Mirza
- The Collected Schizophrenias, Esme Wijun Wang
- Goodbye, Vitamin, Rachel Khong
- The Vegetarian, Han Kang
- All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir, Nicole Chung
- The Sympathizer, Viet Thanh Nguyen
- My Baby First Birthday, Jenny Zhang
- Whiteout Conditions, Tariq Shah
- Little Gods, Meng Jin
ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS FROM PAST READING:
- Fake it till you Break it, Jenn Nguyen
- How to Pronounce Knife, Souvankham Thammavongsa
- Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng
- Everything I Never Told You, Celeste Ng
- To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, Jenny Han
- Crazy Rich Asians, Kevin Kwan
- The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan
- When Dimple Met Rishi, Sandhya Menon
- M. Butterfly, David Henry Hwang
- The Book of Salt, Monique Truong
- On Such a Full Sea, Chang-rae Lee
