Asian Memoir

“Essential reading for anyone interested in contemporary life in China, and highly recommended for memoir enthusiasts in general.” -- Library Journal (starred review) ""Chongda paints a tantalizing portrait of a changing China in his dazzling English-language debut. [Vessel] shines with the...

Euphemistically labeled as the "Water Supply and Prophylaxis Administration" and "HippoEpizootic Administration" of the Imperial Japanese Army, Unit 731 and Unit 100, as well as their subsidiary branches, performed human experimentation on the innocents under the leadership of Dr. Ishii Shiro. Although the exact number of victims is unclear since the Japanese destroyed most of the evidence at the end of the war, but it ranged from 3,000-250,000 innocent men, women, and children.

Award-winning journalist Natasha S. Alford grew up between two worlds as the daughter of an African American father and Puerto Rican mother. In American Negra, a narrative that is part memoir, part cultural analysis, Alford reflects on growing up in a working-class family from the city of...

"Jaed Coffin narrates these personal stories of his encounters..His quiet, calm narration has a steady, honest tone as he describes his upbringing, his relationship with his father, and the low-level fights that take him around Alaska." — AudioFile Magazine This program is read by the author...

Merle Oberon made history when she was announced as a nominee for the Best Actress Oscar in 1936. Her nomination marked the first time the Academy recognized a performer of color. Oberon, born to a South Asian mother and white father, broke through a racial barrier—but no one knew it. Oberon was "passing" for white. In the first biography of Oberon in more than forty years, Mayukh Sen draws on family interviews and untapped archival material to capture the life of an oft-forgotten talent.

Named a Best Memoir of 2023 by Oprah Daily Selected by Time, NPR, and BookPage as a Best Book of 2023 “This book…is what memoir writing in the hands of a caring, curious wunderkind can be.” —Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy From the award-winning author of Stealing Buddha’s Dinner, a...

Richard H. Lawrence, Jr. founded Overlook Investments in Hong Kong in 1991. Since inception, Overlook has grown at 14.3% per year for three decades a remarkable record of growth that is testament to a consistent ability to find and invest in Asia's best companies. This raises two important questions: How did Overlook achieve its success; and how can Overlook best ensure future success? Now, in a level of detail never before disclosed, Richard and the Overlook executive team turn the lens inward to analyze The Overlook Model.

Alexandra Chan thinks she has life figured out until, in the Year of the Ram, the death of her father—her last parent—brings her to her knees, an event seemingly foretold in Chinese mythology. A left-brained archaeologist and successful tiger daughter, Chan finds her logical approach to life utterly fails her in the face of this profound grief. Unable to find a way forward, she must either burn to ash or forge herself anew.

A riotous collection of "witty and captivating" essays by a gay Filipino immigrant in America who is learning that everything is about sex (Bitch Magazine) -- and sex is about power. When Matt Ortile moved from Manila to Las Vegas, the locals couldn't pronounce his name. Harassed as a kid for...

When Ugandan President Idi Amin expelled the country's entire Asian population in 1972, more than 28,000 people from Britain's former colony arrived on airstrips around the country and began building new lives - but their incredible stories remained largely hidden. Fifty years later, first and...

A "riveting" and touching memoir about the understanding one's cultural identity from pastor, business leader, and innovator Dave Gibbons (Makoto Fujimura). A surprising diagnosis of PTSD led Dave Gibbons to look to his past for clues to explain the unexpected result. Born to an American...

Nothing had worked. Not threats or negotiations, not shutting down the betting parlors or opium dens, not throwing Chinese offenders into prison. Not even executing them. The New York DA was running out of ideas, and more people were dying every day as the weapons of choice evolved from hatchets to automatic weapons and even bombs. Welcome to New York City's Chinatown in 1925.

Pioneering Chinese American actress Anna May Wong made more than 60 films, headlined theater and vaudeville productions, and even starred in her own television show. Her work helped shape racial modernity, as she embodied the dominant image of Chinese, and more generally, “Oriental” women between 1925 and 1940. In Anna May Wong, Shirley Jennifer Lim re-evaluates Wong’s life and work as a consummate artist, and positions the actress as a historical and cultural entrepreneur who rewrote categories of representation.

If you're Irish American or African American or Eastern European Jewish American, there's a rich literature to give you a sense of your family's arrival-in-America story. Until now, that hasn't been the case for Chinese Americans. From noted historian Mae Ngai, The Lucky Ones uncovers the three-generational saga of the Tape family. It's a sweeping story centered on patriarch Jeu Dips' (Joseph Tapes') self-invention as an immigration broker in post-gold rush San Francisco, and the extraordinary rise it enables.

The incredible story of the most decorated chaplain in US military history and his path to sainthood in the Roman Catholic Church. Father Emil Kapaun, a humble priest, went far beyond the call of duty during World War II and the Korean War. Often found with the combat medics on the front lines...

Kimi’s Obaachan, her grandmother, had always been a silent presence throughout her youth. Sipping tea by the fire, preparing sushi for the family, or indulgently listening to Ojichan’s (grandfather’s) stories for the thousandth time, Obaachan was a missing link to Kimi’s Japanese heritage, something she had had a mixed relationship with all her life. Growing up in rural Pennsylvania, all Kimi ever wanted to do was fit in, spurning traditional Japanese cuisine and her grandfather’s attempts to teach her the language.

A luminous memoir-in-essays exploring place, identity, and what it means to grow up queer and Asian in the American South.

R. Scott Okamoto had no idea that his job as an English teacher at an evangelical Christian college meant facing bigotry as an Asian American and faux intellectualism as a teacher—and what it would mean for his own journey.

One of America's best-known rock and entertainment journalists describes his journey from his childhood, cooped up in the "rice room" of his family's restaurant in Oakland's Chinatown, where he did chores, to the major role he played as a writer and editor at Rolling Stone. It is a story of teen worship of Elvis, but also of Chinese customs and the tragic murder of his brother, and of the '60s scene in San Francisco, where he found freedom - and his career.

'Chinese' or 'Any other Asian'. The boxes that people of vastly varied East and South East Asian heritage have to tick when declaring their ethnicity on many forms in the UK. For the first time, author Anna Sulan Masing addresses these issues in a comprehensive way. She explores what it means to be East and South East Asian in Britain today, and celebrates the multiple elements and varied experiences that make up ESEA identity. Powerful, moving and illuminating, this will be a must-read for anyone interested in exploring the make-up of our multicultural society.