» On the Shelf

Three tales of two countries

admin — Fri, 10 May 2013 11:12:48 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly The Man Who Dammed the Yangtze By Alex Kuo Haven Books, 2011 In the Chinese city of Changchun, there lives a woman named Ge. In the city of Oshkosh, Wis., there lives a Chinese-American man named G. These two individuals have never met, nor have they even heard of [...]

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Three tales of folk and fantasy

admin — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 10:49:38 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Forgotten Country By Catherine Chung Riverhead Books, 2012 Ever since the Japanese occupation in Korea, each generation in Janie’s family has lost a daughter. Because of this, Janie is charged, at a very young age, to protect and keep her sister Hannah safe. When Hannah suddenly cuts all ties [...]

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3 stories on friendship — Some relationships strengthen and some don’t

admin — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 12:14:18 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Pearl of China By Anchee Min Bloomsbury, 2010 In the southern Chinese town of Chin-kiang during the late 19th century, two young girls meet. The first girl is Willow, the only child of a destitute family. The second girl is Pearl, the daughter of American missionaries working to spread [...]

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Love, it’s complicated

admin — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 12:53:19 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Tiger’s Destiny By Colleen Houck Splinter, 2012 It’s three quests down and one to go for Kelsey Hayes, Ren, and Kishan, as they continue to work to break the curse that forces the two brothers to live part of their days as tigers. In the last three books in [...]

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Short stories for a fast new year

admin — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 12:36:41 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly The Indignation of Haruhi Suzumiya By Nagaru Tanigawa Little, Brown and Company, 2012 The SOS Brigade is back. This time around, they’re up against a student council president bent on shutting down the literature club — and by extension the SOS Brigade as they have commandeered the club’s room [...]

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Living life after loss

admin — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:43:02 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Isle of Dreams By Keizo Hino Dakley Archive Press, 2010 Shozo Sakai hasn’t seen much change in his life. He’s worked at the same construction firm for years, he has no ambitions of moving up the corporate ladder or pursuing a specific career, and he has lived in the [...]

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Strength in Youth — NWAW’s monthly must-reads

admin — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 11:19:35 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Saraswati’s Way By Monika Schroder Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2010 Akash, a 12-year-old boy living in a small village in the Indian desert, is not like the other kids. First of all, he loves school and would rather spend his days in a classroom absorbing knowledge than playing cricket [...]

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Scandals and mysteries abound in this month’s recommended reads

admin — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 12:15:21 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly Tokyo Heist By Diana Renn Viking, 2012 When Violet Rossi, a lover of all things Japan, finds out her father is commissioned to paint a mural in Tokyo, the 16-year-old is thrilled. In the wake of this excitement is a dangerous treasure hunt, as her father’s clients and the [...]

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Rooting for the underdogs in this month’s book selections

admin — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 12:35:42 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly The Choke Artist: Confessions of a Chronic Underachiever By David Yoo Grand Central Publishing, 2012 Growing up, David Yoo hated everything that identified him as Asian: his slanted eyes, his slight frame, and others’ assumptions that he was academically gifted. So in an effort to buck the model minority [...]

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Pictures worth a thousand words — Characters, mangrove trees, and teen romance flourish in pictures and words

admin — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:53:08 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya By Nagaru Tanigawa Little, Brown and Company, 2012 For the first time since Kyon met her, Haruhi Suzumiya seems content with her life. She’s not forcing the SOS Brigade (Save the World By Overloading It With Fun Haruhi Suzumiya Brigade) to participate in any [...]

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Stories of war and survival

admin — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 13:25:23 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Burmese Refugees: Letters from the Thai-Burma Border” Edited by T. F. Rhoden and T. L. S. Rhoden Digital Lycanthrope LLC, 2011 From former student activists and a monk escaping persecution, to a politician’s son and a typical teenage girl caught in a bad situation, the people who reside in [...]

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From aliens to dragons, books on sports that score a home run

admin — Fri, 04 May 2012 12:47:34 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Galaxy Games: The Challengers” By Greg R. Fishbone Lee & Low Books, 2011 When Tyler Sato turns 11, his cousins in Tokyo have a star named after him, but it soon becomes clear that TY SATO is no ordinary star. First, it doesn’t stay in the same place like [...]

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Stories told by comedians and a plastic surgeon that should have been one — NWAW’s monthly must-reads

admin — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 12:50:33 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)” By Mindy Kaling Crown Archetype, 2011 Before she became known as the self-involved, boy-crazy Kelly Kapoor on “The Office,” she was Mindy Kaling, a girl from Cambridge, Mass., with a love for comedy. Growing up, she was a bit on [...]

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Stories about unique API families — NWAW’s monthly must-reads

admin — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 12:47:15 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Terroryaki!” By Jennifer K. Chung 3-Day Books, 2011 Daisy Wang’s older sister Samantha is getting married in three months, but things don’t look too promising as their Taiwanese parents are still shunning Sam’s white fiancé Patrick. As a means of escape from the pre-wedding drama and her family’s scrutiny [...]

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Stories about LOVE — NWAW’s February must-reads

admin — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:26:39 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Cinder” By Marissa Meyer Feiwel and Friends, 2012 At 16, Cinder is the best mechanic in New Beijing. From androids to hovers, there is nothing she can’t fix. Her talents may be revered throughout the Eastern Commonwealth, but Cinder is also considered a technological mistake because she is a [...]

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Short stories about APIs — NWAW’s monthly must-reads

admin — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 14:12:22 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya” By Nagaru Tanigawa Little, Brown and Company, 2011 In this latest installment of the Haruhi Suzumiya series, we join Haruhi, Kyon, and the rest of the S.O.S. Brigade (“Save the World By Overloading It With Fun Harhui Suzumiya”) in a new set of misadventures. [...]

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Author Ron Chew tells often forgotten story of murdered Filipino cannery workers

admin — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 13:50:20 +0000

For Northwest Asian Weekly Ron Chew, executive director of the International Community Health Services Foundation, said his recently completed book on Silme Domingo and Gene Viernes, two young cannery union officials murdered in 1981, is the most difficult piece of writing he’s ever done. “It took me 30 years to arrive in an emotional space [...]

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Stories about artists — NWAW’s monthly must-reads

admin — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 14:16:38 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Drawing from Memory” By Allen Say Scholastic Press, 2011 From the time he was a young boy growing up in Japan, Allen Say knew he wanted to be a cartoonist. Inspired by comic books, he drew what he saw, what he imagined, and what he copied from his beloved [...]

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Old ways meet new, perserving culture — NWAW’s November must-reads

admin — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 15:12:27 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “How to Be an American Housewife” By Margaret Dilloway Berkley Books, 2010 Growing up, Shoko was very close with her brother Taro. But when she got older and decided to marry an American GI and leave Japan after the end of World War II, Taro was not happy about [...]

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Stories about Asians who are gay — NWAW’s October must-reads

admin — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 14:03:33 +0000

By Samantha Pak Northwest Asian Weekly “Leche” By R. Zamora Linmark Coffee House Press, 2011 After 13 years of living in the United States, Vicente De Los Reyes is returning home. Born in the Philippines, Vicente, or Vince, came to Hawaii when he was only 10 years old. He returns after winning a contest and [...]

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