All One World: Multicultural Fiction for Teens
Some great fiction has been written about teens from a different culture who have to deal with problems because of their ethnic background.
This booklist was contributed by Appleton Public Library Reference and Information Services Staff, 7/07
Books set in Asia
Bound by Donna Jo Napoli(2004)In a novel based on Chinese Cinderella tales, fourteen-year-old stepchild Xing-Xing endures a life of neglect and servitude, as her stepmother cruelly mutilates her own child's feet so that she alone might marry well.
Chu Ju's house by Gloria Whelan(2005)In order to save her baby sister, fourteen-year-old Chu Ju leaves her rural home in modern China and earns food and shelter by working on a sampan, tending silk worms, and planting rice seedlings, while wondering if she will ever see her family again.
Eyes of the emperor by Graham Salisbury(2005)Following orders from the United States Army, several young Japanese American men train K-9 units to hunt Asians during World War II.
The kite rider : a novel by Geraldine McCaughrean(2001)In thirteenth-century China, after trying to save his widowed mother from a horrendous second marriage, twelve-year-old Haoyou has life-changing adventures when he takes to the sky as a circus kite rider and ends up meeting the great Mongol ruler Kublai Khan.
Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution by Ji-li Jiang(1998)When China's Communist Party detains Ji-Li's father, the 12-year-old is facedwith a difficult choice.
Rice without rain by Minfong Ho(1990)After social rebels convince the headman of a small village in northern Thailand to resist the land rent, his seventeen-year-old daughter Jinda finds herself caught up in the student uprising in Bangkok.
Samurai shortstop by Alan Gratz(2006)While obtaining a Western education at a prestigious Japanese boarding school in 1890, sixteen-year-old Toyo also receives traditional samurai training which has profound effects on both his baseball game and his relationship with his father.
Wandering warrior by Da Chen(2003)Eleven-year-old Luka, destined to become the future emperor of China, is trained in the ways of the kung fu wandering warriors by the wise monk Atami.
