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Favorite APA Heritage Books for KidsReviewed and Recommended
For Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I wanted to share my all-time favorite Asian Pacific American (APA) children’s picture books. These books deal with a range of issues that face many of our APA children and their friends—celebrating Lunar New Year with our multicultural and multiracial families, celebrating Divali far away from family (and in the snow), encountering poverty and homelessness (and non-model minority) Asian Pacific Americans, embarrassment over grandparents who do not speak English and wear traditional clothing, and whether or not to Americanize our “weird” names that “nobody” can pronounce. Regardless of the specific ethnicities of the characters in the books, these issues can affect all our APA children. These books are great not only for our children, but also for our children’s peers who may not have thought much about these issues before. Buy two today—one for you and one for your child’s classroom or school library!
Dumpling Soup A delightful story about a (mostly) Korean-American family in Hawaii celebrating the Lunar New Year with a huge family reunion, fireworks at midnight, and an Asian Pacific American feast. Seven year old Marisa is finally old enough to help the Yang family women make dumplings or mandoo, but the dumplings she makes are a little lumpy and she worries about them not being good enough for the family. Grandma to the rescue. The family is enormous and multicultural, with Japanese, Chinese, Hawaiian, and haole cousins, all playing side by side. The food is mouthwatering and pan-Asian, including sushi, mochi-zuki, kimchi, roast pork, boiled tripe, octopus, spicy seaweed, and sticky new year’s cake. Many Asian American families will be able to find themselves in this story of love, family, and food. At least two Chinese American children I know (mine, ages 2 and 3) have been inspired by this book to learn how to make dumplings.
Sam and the Lucky Money A wonderful story with a socially conscious message that helps children realize the value of all that they have. Sam is excited to receive his red envelopes of money for Chinese New Year, until he goes to Chinatown with his mother to spend it. They go into a vegetable stand, a bakery, a toy store, and also see the fireworks and lion dance of the New Year. He becomes angry when he finds he cannot buy very much with four dollars. Then he meets a homeless Chinese man with no shoes in the middle of winter, and he gives away his red envelopes so that the man can at least buy some socks. The appearance of a homeless person in Chinatown makes this book uniquely Asian American, dealing with a theme not often found in children’s books. Young children can easily relate to having cold hands and cold feet in the wintertime. It also puts the value of the much-treasured red envelopes into perspective. It opens up a discussion for how lucky our children are to have family, home, and basic necessities like socks and shoes.
Halmoni and the Picnic
Halmoni also offers a fuller picture of immigrants (that some of our legislators could benefit from seeing, too)—Yunmi’s grandmother is not just some old lady, she had a life before she came to America—she was a respected teacher in Korea—and her difficulties learning American culture and English language are not because she is not smart, but because they are complicated.
The Name Jar
This is a story that will resonate with many APA children (especially those not named David or Grace Lee) as well as their friends and classmates as they take pride in their unique names and heritage. As I tell my own children, “That’s not a weird name, just one you’re not used to. If you lived in Korea or India, ‘Ashley’ would be a weird name that no one could pronounce.”
Lights
for Gita
Related Readings
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Yunmi’s grandmother, Halmoni, has just come to New York City from Korea to
help watch Yunmi while her parents are at work. When Yunmi’s friends volunteer
Halmoni to chaperone the class picnic, Yunmi worries that her other classmates
may make fun of Halmoni’s inability to speak English, her traditional hanbok
and pointy shoes, or the kimbap she brings to the picnic to share. Many
Asian Pacific American children will be able to relate to these worries of how
the foreignness of their loved ones will be perceived by others. 
Unhei has just come to America from Korea, and on her first day of school,
she is teased on the bus for her Korean name. She decides that she needs to find
a more American sounding name, and her classmates try to help her by putting
name suggestions into a big glass jar. In the end, she decides that her Korean
name, which means “grace,” fits her just fine, and she teaches her classmates
how to pronounce it correctly. At the same time, a Caucasian classmate also
decides to take on a Korean name, too, meaning “friend.” 
Gita and her family have just moved far away from all their family, from
India to Canada. It is time for the Hindu festival, Divali, a harvest festival
of light and family and best of all, fireworks. However, Divali in Canada (in
November) is not the warm outdoor holiday it is in India, especially as a huge
ice storm hits. Gita is disappointed as her friends cancel their visits and Papa
cancels the fireworks, but Mummy shows her that the true meaning of the holiday
lies beyond fireworks. This story shows how we can celebrate and adapt our Asian
holidays in North America, even in the middle of an ice storm. Asian Pacific
American families finding themselves in snow country will appreciate this book.
