The Best Asian American Books of 2019

Everyday I see people post about how books have changed their lives, in big ways and small, and the profound realization that nobody is ever alone in how they experience the world. There is always someone out there who faces the same identity issues, the same fears, and the same joys.

One of the reasons I started my book club Decolonize Your Bookshelves is because as humans, we are born to love stories. We use stories to organize and communicate our surroundings, our emotions, our unique experiences, and the wisdom we’ve gained. Stories have a way of moving people into action. People will adopt someone else’s experience as their own so it helps build empathy. Stories can also help people have difficult conversations with our friends and family.

I probably read close to sixty books this year (shout out to public libraries!). Something that I was thinking about a lot over the past year was that for all our fascination with technology, we’ve forgotten how transformative a simple book can be. 

Books have always been at the forefront of my own decolonization process. It started in 2008 when I read The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid and Dogeaters by Jessica Hagedorn.

Growing up in the 80s and 90s, there were almost no Asian American characters in the books I read. And hardly any of the books I read were written by Asian Americans. But there is a new wave of writers that’s rushing in. It’s a brave, honest and culturally proud group of storytellers whose mission is to be seen and be heard and to tell the truth. Little by little, we change and grow as we read. And there are some significant books that change us substantially and elucidate our path. 

Here are my favorite Asian American books of 2019, in no particular order…

Frankly in Love

I was skeptical of David Yoon’s debut novel after I read the synopsis on the jacket cover and was worried that it would be some Kumail Nanjiani-inspired bullshit love story about an Asian man desperate for white approval. The plot synopsis on Goodreads does it a bit more justice. (Side note: who wrote the jacket cover summary? Because I just want to talk…)

After reading the novel, I was surprised and relieved. And also, entertained and moved. It seems so simple but it’s a story that is almost never explored in Asian American literary canon. And to be clear, it is a very specifically Asian American story. Kids who grow up in Asia don’t really have to deal with issues of racial and cultural identity and assimilation the way we do.

Oxford Kondo said it best in his review: What is the duty of second generation Asian Americans in preserving and carrying on their parents’ legacy? This is one of the central questions in the novel…Frankly In Love dares to suggest that actually, you can’t separate culture and community from the people, especially from a minority people going through similar struggles.

This is, in essence, the completely unexplored topic of Yellow Love. Whereas other minority communities openly celebrate in-group relationships as defiant resistance to assimilationist pressures, (yellow) Asian Americans have been much more reluctant to do so. We second generation Asian Americans are always talking about what misunderstood outcasted freaks we are. There is truth to this. We will never exist again. Our children, unlike us, will have the benefit of parents who feel at home at home. We are a lost generation that was handed a blank map from birth. Shouldn’t misunderstood outcasted freaks find solace in the only other misunderstood outcasted freaks that can get us: other second generation Asian Americans? That’s the most fucking romantic story of all. (Oxford Kondo, Frankly in Love Shows Why 2nd Generation Asian Americans Need Each Other)

By the way, here is some trivia for you. David Yoon is married to the current queen of young adult fiction, Nicola Yoon, author of Everything, Everything and The Sun Is Also A Star.

Dear America: Notes from an Undocumented Citizen

Technically this book was published in November 2018 but I read it in January 2019 and it made such an impact on my entire year that I feel like I’m doing it a disservice by not putting it on this list.

Filipino American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Jose Antonio Vargas’ memoir was the very first book I read this year. I also attended his author talk and book reading in January when he came to Baltimore and it turned out to be a very serendipitous night for me.

1. As usual, all of the Filipino people in attendance gravitated towards each other and ended up exchanging numbers and hanging out afterwards. I know it sounds really corny but whatever — I met some of my best friends that night. (Shout out to Chris, Derrick and Brian!)

2. Jose encouraged me to launch Decolonize Your Bookshelves, to stick to my idea of focusing solely on Filipino writers, and even connected me to Gina Apostol, the author of Insurrecto, who became my first featured author.

3. I met Tracy Dimond, the programming director at Enoch Pratt, who became one of Decolonize Your Bookshelves biggest champions. She and I made plans to meet up and talk and when we eventually did, we hit it off and she ended up sponsoring two of my events.

Jose’s memoir is about his immigration from the Philippines to the US when he was 12 years old and his life as an undocumented American since then. It is also about his lifelong connection to his mother, who he never saw in person again after he left (he is now 38 years old). Through his story, he explains immigration policy in America and why so many undocumented people are left with little choice but to take their chances and stay despite the precariousness of their situation.

This is a book that I feel all Americans need to read with an open mind. Our immigration policies need reforming, and we need to figure out how to allow our undocumented citizens to stay here legally.

They Called Us Enemy

George Takei is a Japanese American activist (especially for gay rights) and actor best known for portraying Hikaru Sulu on the first iteration of Star Trek. This is his graphic novel recounting his childhood imprisoned within American concentration camps during World War II. It is a story of a particular time in his life that ended up shaping the person he grew up to be.

This is a great book for teenagers and adults. It acts as a reminder of a shameful time in America's history and shows us how not much has changed since then. It also cautions us on how easy it is to turn your neighbor into an “other” or an enemy.

Also, his parents were fucking heroes.

I Was Their American Dream

This is the debut coming-of-age graphic memoir from NPR journalist and author Malaka Gharib that explains how she's navigated white-dominated spaces—as a teenager, and as an adult. Born to a Filipino Catholic mother and an Egyptian Muslim dad in LA, she struggled to understand and accept her own fascination with pre-Internet, American pop culture while her classmates thought of her as a freak.

By the end of her memoir, Malaka learns to embrace her misfit self and her hyphenated Filipino-Egyptian identity. I Was Their American Dream uses humor to tackle the nuance of the ubiquitous-for-Asian-Americans-question, "What are you?” She also discusses what it's like to be the only person in her family to be married to a white person, and offers advice for accepting the weirdo you've always been.

I feel like Malaka’s life growing up in Los Angeles really mirrored my own here in Baltimore — I was a weirdo who was REALLY into knowing everything about movies and books, I wanted to go to NYU and Columbia but didn’t get in so I went to Hunter College and University of Maryland instead, I wanted to study art, and I had a huge Filipino extended family. And even though I’m not part Egyptian, one of my very first trips abroad (without my parents) was to Cairo! After college, I also got a corporate job in a super white office in DC.

Like, I feel like if Malaka and I knew each other as teenagers, we would have been best friends or kindred spirits. In fact, I found myself actually regretful that I didn’t have a friend like her growing up because majority of the kids I was surrounded by at that time in my life were so unbelievably boring and one dimensional. I also have such a soft spot for reading about other Filipino misfits (I see you!!).

Body Papers

The Body Papers is Grace Talusan’s memoir, told in a collection of essays in which the notion of the body is a central theme. Rather than addressing her own sense of embodiment, Grace examines the body through how it is read by others, how it has been harmed, how it has been cut up and put together. She presents "the concept of 'the body' as a concentric circle that expands outward: the female body, the body of the family, the body of the Philippines, the body of a writer's work."

(Grace Talusan was the second author to be featured at a Decolonize Your Bookshelves event in October 2019.)

Lalani of the Distant Sea

This is a middle grade fantasy novel (intended for kids ages 8-12) that was inspired by Filipino folklore. Written by Filipino American author Erin Entrada Kelly, it is the story of Lalani Sarita, a twelve-year-old girl who lives on the island of Sanlagita in the shadow of a vengeful mountain. Lalani is looked down upon by others, though she does have a few good friends. When her mother falls very ill, Lalani decides to find a way to heal her. She undergoes many trials and travels far from her home, crossing the sea and encountering a variety of different beings.

It is a dark story that can get a little scary at times but that made it even more thrilling! My kids and I read this together and we loved rooting for the strong little heroine, Lalani.

It’s also a story that is FILLED with Filipino pride.

Malaya: Essays on Freedom

I was already a fan of Filipino American author Cinelle Barnes’ previous novel, Monsoon Mansion, so I was really looking forward to her latest, a book of essays. Cinelle writes about her rough childhood in the Philippines and then moved to New York City as an undocumented teenager who had to take odd jobs such as a cleaning lady and nanny in order to support herself and avoid getting caught by authorities.

Cinelle’s essays are an intensely personal exploration of race, class, and identity as a woman—and an American—in a divided country and specifically, in the Southern US. I thought her strongest essays were the ones on how she navigates interracial relationships (platonically) as a brown woman. Like all brown women who are in relationships with white men or women understand, even if their relationship is healthy and strong, there is a complex struggle when dealing with their families and friends.

Dear Girls

This book is the only one on this list that is definitely not for kids.

I had just finished reading Ali Wong’s memoir when I wrote this blog post and it was the perfect way to end my year. My husband and I took turns reading passages out loud to each other between fits of laughter. Honestly, if you don’t crack up while you’re reading this, are you even alive??

I was already a big fan of Ali’s after both of her Netflix specials and Always Be My Maybe was one of my favorite movies of the year. (Side note: In Baby Cobra, Ali was eight months pregnant and her appearance onstage resonated so heavily that she became a popular Halloween costume.) When she announced the release date of her book, I immediately put myself on the hold list at the library so I could have it the day it came out.

Ali writes like a Southeast Asian chick, not like an East Asian chick. If you follow the Asian American literary genre at all, you know exactly what I’m talking about. If you don’t get it, just move along.

Patron Saints of Nothing

In his latest novel, Randy Ribay explores themes of family, belonging, and ethnic and national identity through a distinctly Filipino American lens. His work — which is exhilarating, harrowing, uplifting and redemptive--is a powerful testament to so many of our experiences, and it is deeply resonant for me personally.

One of my favorite chapters in Patron Saints of Nothing (don’t worry, this isn’t a spoiler) is when Jay has a conversation with his Uncle about the political climate on the ground in the Philippines. That conversation taught me how to handle it when my own friends and relatives try to invalidate my moral understanding of Duterte’s War on Drugs because I’m Filipino American and I grew up here in the states, not in the Philippines. 

(Randy Ribay was the third author to be featured at a Decolonize Your Bookshelves event in November 2019.)

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