7 AAPI Authors and the Books That We Love

In honor of May being Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, we are highlighting authors in the AAPI community whose work inspires us. Their work is not monolithic and expands to stories of immigration, the search for racial identity, discrimination in the United States, and so much more.

As we shed a light on the United States’ history of racism and the varied experiences of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, we also acknowledge the beauty, influence, and impact of the AAPI community. It is important to acknowledge the contributions of the AAPI community not just in literature and not just in the month of May, but all year long.

1. Gail Tsukiyama, author of “Women of the Silk”

Known as a wise storyteller, Gail Tsukiyama is the bestselling author of “Women of the Silk” and “The Samurai’s Garden.” She is also the recipient of the Academy of American Poets Award and the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award. The San Francisco native was born to a Chinese mother from Hong Kong and a Japanese father from Hawaii. She received her Master of Arts degree in English from San Francisco State University.

Published in 1991, “Women of the Silk” was Tsukiyama’s debut novel. The storyline, set in rural China in 1926, is about a group of women who tirelessly work in a silk factory from dusk to dawn. The women lead the town’s first strike, and through the sisterhood they forge, they are able to gain freedom. Through her sophisticated prose, Tsukiyama eloquently portrays the life of silk workers and Chinese village life and the strength and courage of women to fight for human rights.

2. Shirley Geok-lin Lim, author of “Among the White Moon Faces”

Shirley Geok-lin Lim always considered herself to be a poet more than anything else. Yet, her writing resume includes poetry, memoirs, short stories, and novels. After a successful career that left her with many awards, including two American Book Awards, Lim went on to teach as an English professor at the University of California.

Her beloved novel “Among the White Moon Faces” is a story of courage and perseverance. In her memoir, Lim shares her journey from her displaced Malaysian girlhood to her life in America as a wife, mother, professor, and author. Lim’s candidness and authenticity is relatable as she describes her coming of age story paired with the alienation of moving from her identity as a displaced Asian woman to an Asian American woman.

3. Maxine Hong Kingston, author of “The Woman Warrior: China Men”

Maxine Hong Kingston is said to be a genre-defying writer who inspired generations of Asian American writers and women alike to tell their stories. Kingston received the National Medal of Arts in 2014 from President Barack Obama. In 1976, she won the 1976 National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction, and in the following decades, she would become one of the most frequently taught living authors at American colleges and universities.

An inside look into the hearts and minds of Chinese immigrants in America across generations, “The Woman Warrior: China Men” is a seamless tapestry of myth and memory. Kingston explores the varied experiences of Chinese immigrants over an expansive time period from the days of the transcontinental railroad in the 1840s to the Vietnam War. She shares about the oppression women face in America, as well as her mother’s tales of the strong, wily women in the “old country.”

4. Carlos Bulosan, author of “America Is in the Heart”

A poet, fiction writer, short story teller, and activist, Carlos Bulosan was a Filipino American immigrant born into a farming family in the rural village of Mangusmana. He came to the United States in 1930 at the age of 17, and with only a few years of education and little English proficiency under his belt, he was forced to take low paying jobs to get by. In addition to economic hardship, Bulosan faced much racial brutality, discrimination, and unhealthy workplaces that would later motivate his writing.

Bulosan’s semi-autobiographical novel, “America Is in the Heart” tells the story of a Filipino peasant who comes to the United States to pursue the American dream. However, he is quite quickly met with the reality of racial violence in the states. Bulosan uses his writing as a form of social criticism as he chronicles the intense racial abuse he and other immigrant workers experienced in the fields, orchards, towns, cities, and canneries of California. He poetically and candidly depicts the criminalization of immigrants in America.

5. Ling Ma, author of “Severance”

Ling Ma is a Chinese American novelist best known for her first book “Severance,” which won the Kirkus Prize. She is also an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago.

Published in 2018, “Severance” is a satirical science fiction about a virus that originates in Chinese economic center Shenzhen and spreads around the world. The “Shen Fever” leaves its victims as “zombies of repetition” until eventually their bodies disintegrate. Many readers have commented on the parallels between the storyline of “Severance” and the effects of coronavirus in 2020.

6. Weike Wang, author of “Chemistry”

Chinese American author, Weike Wang is the author of “Chemistry,” which won the 2018 PEN/Hemingway Award. Her fiction has been published in numerous publications including the Alaska Quarterly Review, Kenyon Review, and The New Yorker.

“Chemistry” is a quirky, insightful, and relatable coming-of-age novel and Wang’s debut work. The storyline follows Wang’s seemingly perfect life: a boyfriend who has just popped the question and a successful scholarly career in pursuit of a prestigious PhD in chemistry that will make her parents proud. When it all becomes too overwhelming, Wang begins breaking beakers in the lab and veering off the straight and narrow path that has been set for her.

7. Cathy Park Hong, author of “Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning”

The “model minority” myth is debunked in Cathy Park Hong’s “Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning.” Throughout the novel, Hong uses social criticism, memoir writing, and history to comment on racial consciousness in America then and now. She shares her own experience growing up as the daughter of Korean immigrants and the shame and dissonance she felt in relation to her racial identity.

Hong is New York Times Bestselling author and the winner of a National Book Critics Circle Award. The Los Angeles native has published three volumes of poetry. Her writing conveys the duality of her experience as an Asian American woman and alienation from white American culture.

Photo by Nguyen Dang Hoang Nhu on Unsplash