CURATION BY CEE • Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (AAPI) Kids Books

In Drawn Together, a young boy and his grandfather who do not speak the same language bond through their shared love of art and storytelling.

Summer is a special season for the young girl in When Lola Visits. It’s when her Lola—her grandmother—visits from the Philippines, and the young girl wants to preserve this time with her Lola before she leaves for home.

In Watercress, “Gathering watercress by the side of the road brings a girl closer to her family’s Chinese Heritage.”

In Yes We Will, you learn about different Asian Americans—artists, politicians, celebrities—that made a difference in this country and inspire us all like Yo-Yo Ma, Kamala Harris, and H.E.R.

Based on true events of the Maggie Tokuda-Hall’s grandparents, Love in the Library is a love story set in a Japanese internment camp during World War II.

Gibberish is about a boy’s first day of school in a new country where everybody sounds like they’re speaking gibberish because he doesn’t know the language.

“A stunning picture book debut showcasing the love between grandparents and grandchildren, the challenges of memory loss, and the joy that sweet reminders of a faraway home can bring, from award-winning, bestselling author Thanhhà Lạ.”

A beautiful “intergenerational journey full of delicious flavors and fun food facts that celebrates a family’s treasured recipes” in Tomatoes for Neela. 

In The Yellow Suitcase, a young girl travels to India to mourn her grandmother’s passing. Filled with grief and anger, she has a hard time coping with it.

Room for Everyone is “a young boy on a crowded bus discovers that, after some wiggles and giggles, there’s room for everyone in this lighthearted rhyming picture book set in Zanzibar.”

Korean folktales are brought to life in When You Trap a Tiger. A tiger appears out of nowhere when Lily and her mother move in with her sick halmoni (grandmother), uncovering secret family history that has Lily make a deal with the tigers for her halmoni’s health.

A high-sea adventure set in a Thai-inspired fantasy world, The Last Mapmaker is a tale about a young girl—who is an assistant to Mangkon’s most celebrated mapmaker and the daughter of a conman—joins an expedition to chart the southern seas, and encounters so much more than she ever expected.

Told in verse, Inside Out and Back Again tells the story of a young girl who’s family has to leave their home in Vietnam after Saigon fell and flees to America.

In this heartwarming graphic novel, Tidesong is about a young witch training to be the best witch, but her magic isn’t the best. She’s sent to her relatives to teach her magic, but they’re disinterested in teaching her. When a spell backfires as she practices, her magic becomes tied to a young water dragon named Liu who cannot remember where he came from.

A graphic novel that is “part historical fiction, part fable,” The Legend of Auntie Po follows thirteen-year-old Mei as a reimagined Paul Bunyan working in the Sierra Nevada logging camp in 1885.

In Front Desk, Mia Tang has many secrets—she lives in a motel with her family (who’s parents also worked there), her parents hide immigrants at the hotel, and she wants to be a writer which isn’t something her mom wants.

Inspired by the legend of the Monkey King, Girl Giant and the Monkey King teams up two powerful beings—Thom Ngho, an eleven year old who has super strength, and the Monkey King, the legendary trickster deity—as they trie to find the Monkey King’s magical staff.

In the middle of nowhere in Maizy Chen’s Last Chance, Maizy and her family are stuck in Last Chance, Minnesota for the foreseeable future (until her grandfather gets better), and there, she learns about their family owned generational restaurant—The Golden Palace—and the complicated history in their family.

In this Little Women inspired story, More to the Story follows four sisters from a Muslim family living Georgia as they try to deal with their father going overseas for a job. One of the sisters, Jameela, makes it her mission to be the best journalist but at what cost to her family and friendships?

Hello, Universe is “told from four intertwining points of view—two boys and two girls—the novel celebrates bravery, being different, and finding your inner bayani (hero),” and explores Filipinx characters and culture. 

In Amal Unbound, all Amal wants to do is become a teacher, but her dreams are dashed from her when she is forced into indentured servitude to pay off her family’s debt. There, Amal struggles and has to figure out how to fight to get her life back.

Prairie Lotus explores the life of a young half-Asian girl named Hanna living in 1880 and the racism she constantly faces living in a small town in America with her father.

Brimming with mythology and culture, Zachary Ying and the Dragon Emperor follows Zachary Ying across the China “to seal the leaking portal to the Chinese underworld and save the mortal realm.”

Pashmima is a beautiful graphic novel about a young girl who’s trying to figure out why her mother left her home in India and learns about her heritage through the mysterious pashmina that was tucked away.

Told through Nish’a letters to her mother, The Night Diary follows Nisha’s journey to finding a new home in a divided country after India’s partition.

Inspired by Hindu mythology, Aru Shah and the End of Time follows twelve-year-old Aru Shah unknowingly frees an ancient demon whose duty is to awake the God of Destruction by lighting a cursed lamp. In order to stop the demon, she has to find the reincarnations of the five legendary Pandava brothers and make her way to the Kingdom of Death.