Asian and Pasifika Voices: Books for Teens

A freshman at MIT, seventeen-year-old Mei Lu tries to live up to her Taiwanese parents' expectations, but no amount of tradition, obligation, or guilt prevent her from hiding several truths--that she is a germaphobe who cannot become a doctor, she prefers dancing to biology, she decides to reconnect with her estranged older brother, and she is dating a Japanese boy. Can she find a way to be herself, before her web of lies unravels?

After her mother's suicide, grief-stricken Leigh Sanders travels to Taiwan to stay with grandparents she never met, determined to find her mother who she believes turned into a bird.

"When artistic and sensitive Santi arrives at his new high school, everyone in the wildly talented marching band welcomes him with open arms. Everyone except for the prickly, proud musical prodigy Suwa, who doesn’t think Santi has what it takes to be in the band. But Santi and Suwa share painful pasts, and when they open up to each other, a tentative friendship begins. And soon, that friendship turns into something more...Will their fresh start...

"Sam Sakamoto doesn't have space in her life for dreams. With the recent death of her mother, Sam's focus is the farm, which her family will lose if they can't make one last payment. There's no time for her secret and unrealistic hope of becoming a photographer, no matter how skilled she's become. But Sam doesn't know that an even bigger threat looms on the horizon. On December 7, 1941, Japanese airplanes attack the US naval base at Pearl Harbor....

Now that Girls Forever is the number-one K-pop group in the world, Rachel Kim is famous and happy, but when she meets Alex she considers breaking the rules of fame to fall in love. Rachel Kim is at the top of her game: Girls Forever is now the number-one K-pop group in the world, and her viral airport styling attracts the attention of fashion's biggest names. The only thing that’s missing is love, but in this world, falling in love can cost...

"Three teenaged girls living on Jar Island band together to enact revenge on the people that have hurt them"--

Fatima lives in the city of Noor, a thriving stop along the Silk Road. There the music of myriad languages fills the air, and people of all faiths weave their lives together. However, the city bears scars of its recent past, when the chaotic tribe of Shayateen djinn slaughtered its entire population -- except for Fatima and two other humans. Now ruled by a new maharajah, Noor is protected from the Shayateen by the Ifrit, djinn of order and reason,...

Aza Wu knows that casting magic can kill--it killed her sister--but she needs money desperately to pay off Saint Willow, who controls her sector of Lotusland, and save the family teahouse, so she secretly enters an underground casting tournament--and finds herself competing against other castors with "full magic," and where even victory could cause her to lose her freedom, her magic, and her life.

"Self preservation. That's Bobby's motto for surviving his notoriously violent high school unscathed. Being out and queer would put an unavoidable target on his back, especially in a Filipino community that frowns on homosexuality. It's best to keep his head down, get good grades, and stay out of trouble. But when Bobby is unwillingly outed in a terrible way, he no longer has the luxury of being invisible. A vicious encounter has him scrambling for...

"Chloe knows what it takes to be the perfect Liang daughter-stay in Manila, study business management, and join the family company. But when she unexpectedly gets off the wait list for USC, her dream of becoming an animator in the United States is suddenly within reach. Before she goes, her auntie insists on planning a traditional debut for Chloe's eighteenth birthday. And while a party with all her friends and family sounds like the perfect send-off,...