Countries & Cultures

Having fled Cambodia four years earlier to escape the Khmer Rouge army, seventeen-year-old Sundara is torn between remaining faithful to her own people and enjoying life in her Oregon high school as a "regular" American.
224 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Cambodia, High School, Love

Book 2 of the Guild of Specialists trilogy. As the Kalaxx warriors close in on the hidden cove where they are stranded, Becca and Doug unearth a riddle linked to a 1533 painting, which may hold the key to the Guild's dark secrets and to finding their parents. But how can they solve the puzzle and escape with their lives before their enemies attack?
288 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  China, Pirates, Sea Adventures, Spies, Survival

Book 1 of the Guild of Specialists trilogy. While trying to find their missing parents, Doug and Becca encounter an ancient order of Chinese mercenaries, a brutal pirate warlord, a feisty Texan heiress, and a stolen cache of a volatile explosive called zoridium. By their saga's end, the duo has exposed a murderous plot involving their parents and uncovered a secret society hidden from the world for hundreds of years.
288 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  China, Pirates, Sea Adventures, Spies, Survival

On the day that her uncle takes her to be sold to the highest bidder, eleven-year-old Lu Si-Yan learns what it really means to be born a girl in her culture. Torn from her family, she is taken to the big city where she will become a servant to a wealthy family, and someday marry their son. But Lu Si-Yan is determined to return to her mother and brother, so she embarks on a journey to escape and find her way home.
224 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  China, Slavery

In a society where boys are more valuable than girls, and parents are only allowed to have two children, fourteen-year-old Chu Ju decides to run away from home in order to prevent her parents from selling her baby sister. Now she has to find a way to support herself alone.
240 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  China

Part of the Girls of Many Lands series. Called boyish by her new family for being able to read and write, twelve-year-old orphaned Spring Pearl's odd ways help save the family during the 1857 Opium War in China.
224 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  China, 19th Century

Part of the Royal Diaries series. In 531 A.D., a fifteen-year-old princess of the Hsien tribe in southern China keeps a diary which describes her role as liaison between her own people and the local Chinese colonists, in times of both peace and war.
300 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  China, Princesses

Ailin's life takes a different turn when she defies the traditions of upper-class Chinese society by refusing to have her feet bound.
160 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  China

Sequel to Mountain Light. When he accidentally kills a Manchu, a fifteen-year-old Chinese boy is sent to America to join his father and other Chinese working to build a tunnel for the transcontinental railroad through the Sierra Nevada mountains in 1867.
352 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  China, 19th Century, Wild West Pioneers, Racism

In 1947, a Chinese girl comes to Brooklyn, where she starts to make friends and feel at home when she discovers Baseball and the Brooklyn Dodgers.
160 pages, Grades 3-6
related subjects:  China

Moon Shadow was eight when he sailed from China to join his father Windrider in America. Windrider lived in San Francisco's Chinatown and worked in a laundry. With Moon Shadow's help, Windrider was willing to endure the mockery of the other Chinese, the poverty, and the longing for his wife and his own country in order to make his dream come true.
256 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  China, Racism

Left an orphan after the influenza epidemic in British East Africa in 1919, thriteen-year-old Rachel is tricked into returning to England, where her only dream is to return to Africa and rebuild her parents' mission hospital.
208 pages, Grades 4 and up
related subjects:  East Africa, Orphans

After being kidnapped and brought to the emperor's palace in Ethiopia, twelve-year-old Saba discovers that she and her brother are part of the emperor's desperate attempt to consolidate power in 1846.
210 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Ethiopia, Orphans

Desta and the other members of her Falasha family, Jews suffering from discrimination in Ethiopia, finally flee the country and attempt the dangerous journey to Israel.
192 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Ethiopia, Middle East, Refugees

In Gandhi-era India, 12-year-old Leela's life changes dramatically when she becomes a widow and must renounce the happy life she knew, and prepare for a life of mourning a husband she barely knew.
288 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  India

Sequel to The Conch Bearer. Anand journeys back to ancient India where he encounters powerful sorcerors, spoiled princes, noble warriors, and evil djinns.
336 pages, Grades 3-6
related subjects:  India, Magic, Genies (or Djinn)

A California teenager in India spends the summer in India and learns about love, friendship, and herself.
224 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  India

In India, twelve-year-old Anand discovers his destiny as the bearer of a magical and powerful conch shell, and must journey to return it to its rightful home high in the Himalayan mountains while enemies try to steal it from him.
272 pages, Grades 3-6
related subjects:  India, Magic

In 1939, twelve-year-old Neela meets a young freedom fighter and soon after must rely on his help when her father fails to return home from a march in Calcutta against the British occupation.
198 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  India

Part of the Royal Diaries series. Beginning in 1627, Princess Jahanara, first daughter of Shah Jahan of India's Mogul Dynasty, writes in her diary about political intrigues, weddings, battles, and other experiences of her life.
186 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  India, Princesses

When thirteen-year-old Koly enters into an ill-fated arranged marriage, she must either suffer a destiny dictated by India's tradition or find the courage to oppose it.
192 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Sewing, India

In India, a young girl is outcast from her village because of the incredible power she has when she dances.
224 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Dancing, India

Driven by his sense of "dharma," or honor, young King Tamar sets off on a perilous journey, with a significance greater than he can imagine, during which he meets talking animals, villainous and noble kings, demons, and the love of his life.
304 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Magic, Talking Animals, India

15-year-old J.J. disappears into the fairy world to plug a time leak caused 150 years ago when his great-grandfather disappeared.
448 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Ireland, Fairies, Parallel Universe

When a terrible blight attacks Ireland's potato crop in 1845, twelve-year-old Nory's courage and ingenuity help her family and neighbors survive.
176 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  19th Century, Famine, Ireland

A collection of illustrated Japanese folktales.
32 pages, Grades 3-5
related subjects:  Japan

With national pride and also fear, a brother and sister face the oppressive occupation of Korea by Japan during World War II, which threatens to suppress Korean culture entirely.
208 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Japan, Korea, World War II

Describes the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, particularly as it affects Sachi, who becomes one of the Hiroshima Maidens.
64 pages, Grades 4 and up
related subjects:  Japan, Nuclear Weapons, World War II

Hospitalized with the dreaded atom bomb disease, leukemia, a child in Hiroshima races against time to fold one thousand paper cranes to verify the legend that by doing so a sick person will become healthy.
80 pages, Grades 3-6
related subjects:  Japan, Nuclear Weapons

On August 6, 1945, Hiroshima was destroyed by the first atom bomb ever dropped on a city. Told through the memories of survivors, this book tells what happened on that day.
160 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Japan, Nuclear Weapons, World War II

A legendary archer from ancient Korea travels forward in time to twelve-year-old Kevin's bedroom in New York. Now Kevin has to find a way to get him back before he changes history forever.
176 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Korea, Time Travel

While working on a project, Julia, a Korean-American, and her friend Patrick learn not just about silkworms, but about tolerance, prejudice, friendship, and patience.
240 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Korea, Racism

Part of the Royal Diaries series. In a series of messages placed in her grandmother's ancestral jar, a seventh century princess and future ruler of the Korean kingdom of Silla vents her frustration at not being permitted to study astronomy because she is a girl.
187 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Korea, Princesses

With national pride and also fear, a brother and sister face the oppressive occupation of Korea by Japan during World War II, which threatens to suppress Korean culture entirely.
208 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Japan, Korea, World War II

Tree-ear, a thirteen-year-old orphan in medieval Korea, lives under a bridge in a potters' village, and longs to learn how to throw the delicate celadon ceramics himself.
192 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Korea, Pottery, Homelessness

In Korea in 1473, eleven-year-old Young-sup overcomes his rivalry with his older brother Kee-sup, who as the first-born son receives special treatment from their father, and combines his kite-flying skill with Kee-sup's kite-making skill in an attempt to win the New Year kite-fighting competition.
144 pages, Grades 4-6
related subjects:  Korea, Brothers, 14th-15th Century

Impatient with the constraints put on her as an aristocratic girl living in Korea during the seventeenth century, twelve-year-old Jade Blossom determines to see beyond her small world.
112 pages, Grades 4-6
related subjects:  Korea, 17th Century

Fourteen-year-old Clara is invited to Mexico to meet her grandparents for the first time. When she gets there, she's stunned by their life: they live in a simple shack in a small mountain village, very different from suburban Maryland.
272 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Mexico, Grandparents

Sofia's tales of growing up in Texas, full of family traditions: Easter cascarones, her best friend's quinceanera, the Christmas nacimiento, and eating the tequila worm. When Sofia receives a scholarship to boarding school, she longs to explore life beyond the barrio, even though it means leaving her family for a strange world of rich kids.
199 pages, Grades 5-8
related subjects:  Mexico

A cabin boy on a pirate ship finds himself in San Diego in 1846 as war breaks out between the United States and Mexico.
194 pages, Grades 3-6
related subjects:  Mexico, Pirates, 19th Century, Wild West Pioneers

Naomi Soledad Leon Outlaw's life with Gram and her little brother, Owen, is happy & peaceful until their mother reappears after 7 years of being gone, stirring up questions, and challenging Naomi to discover who she really is.
246 pages, Grades 4-6
related subjects:  Mexico, Mothers

Thirteen-year-old Azad, a Kurdish boy living in Iran, tries desperately to cling to the life he has known, but the political situation in Iran during the war with Iraq, and Saddam Hussein's persecution of the Kurds forces his family to flee.
152 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Refugees, Middle East

In ancient Persia, Mitra and her little brother, Babak, scratch out a living by begging and stealing food, but Mitra knows they are exiled royals if they could only rejoin the rest of their family. Then they discover that Babak has a strange power, he can dream other people's dreams. They use this gift to gain money until they attract the attention of the wrong person.
304 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Homelessness, Middle East

During the 2001 Afghan War, the lives of Najmah, a young refugee from Afghanaistan, and Nustrat, an American-Muslim teacher who is awaiting her husband's return from Mazar-i-Sharif, intersect at a school in Pakistan.
288 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Middle East, Refugees

The wars between Iraq and the US are explained through a history of the region along with descriptions of the conflict, weapons, soldiers, key leaders, major events,a nd challenges in establishing peace.
96 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Middle East

When beggar girl, Animah appeals to the princess for help, the black-hearted wife of Aladdin throws an old lamp at her head. The lamp holds a jinni who informs Aminah that she can make three wishes after each full moon. With the jinni's magic, Aminah regains security and comfort. But the power-hungry princess hunts down Aminah and the lamp.
272 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Genies (or Djinn), Middle East, Poverty

Nineteen-year-old Thura kept a diary during the conflict in Iraq, which documents the days leading up to the bombings, the war itself, and the lawless aftermath. As Thura describes her life and that of her two younger sisters, she shows the many small details that illuminate the reality of war for Iraqi families, and especially for Iraqi children.
160 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Middle East

Sequel to Parvana's Journey. Fourteen-year-old Shauzia dreams of seeing the ocean and eventually making a new life in France, but it is hard to reconcile that dream with the terrible conditions of the Afghan refugee camp where she lives.
176 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Homelessness, Middle East, Refugees

These new and collected poems of Naomi Shihab Nye describe the Middle East, Jerusalem, the West Bank, family, and being Arab-American.
160 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Middle East

Sequel to The Breadwinner. Kabul, Afghanistan is in ruins. Parvana, separated from the rest of her family, sets out alone to find them. She meets other victims of war: an infant boy in a bombed-out village, a nine-year-old girl who thinks she has magic powers over landmines, and a boy with one leg. The strength of their bond helps them to survive the most desperate conditions.
176 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Homelessness, Middle East, Refugees

Samir, a Palestinian boy, is sent for surgery to an Israeli hospital where he makes friends with an Israeli boy, Yonatan, and travels with him to Mars where Samir finds peace over his younger brother's death in the war.
160 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Middle East

Because the Taliban rulers of Kabul, Afghanistan, impose strict limitations on women's freedom and behavior, eleven-year-old Parvana must disguise herself as a boy so that her family can survive after her father's arrest.
170 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Middle East

When Karen and Yasmine become friends as well as members of a mixed Arab and Jewish track team in Israel, relatives and friends of both girls disapprove of the relationship.
128 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Middle East

Every night, Shahrazad begins a story. And every morning, the Sultan lets her live another day, only because he wants to hear more stories. But after one thousand nights, Shahrazad is running out of tales. Thirteen-year-old Marjan must undertake a dangerous and forbidden mission: sneak from the harem and travel the city, and learn new stories for Shahrazade.
224 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Middle East, Princesses

Sixty poems from different Middle Eastern poets depict the love of family, friends, and for the Earth, the daily occurrences of life that touch us forever, the longing for a sense of place. These poems show that beneath the veil of stereotypes, our human connections are stronger than our cultural differences.
112 pages, Grades 3-7
related subjects:  Middle East

When fourteen-year-old Liyanne Abboud, her younger brother, and her parents move from St. Louis to a new home between Jerusalem and the Palestinian village where her father was born, they face many changes and must deal with the tensions between Jews and Palestinians.
272 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Middle East

Sequel to Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind. Having relented to the ways of her people in Pakistan and married the rich older man to whom she was pledged against her will, Shabanu is now the victim of his family's blood feud and the malice of his other wives.
336 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Middle East

Her father's involvement with the Kurdish resistance movement in Iraq forces thirteen-year-old Tara to flee with her family over the border into Iran, where they face an unknown future.
288 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  Refugees, Middle East

When eleven-year old Shabanu, the daughter of a nomad in the Cholistan Desert of present-day Pakistan, is pledged in marriage to an older man whose money will bring prestige to the family, she must either accept the decision, as is the custom, or risk the consequences of defying her father's wishes.
288 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Middle East

Desta and the other members of her Falasha family, Jews suffering from discrimination in Ethiopia, finally flee the country and attempt the dangerous journey to Israel.
192 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Ethiopia, Middle East, Refugees

Eight-year-old Kahu, a member of the Maori tribe of Whangara, New Zealand, is descended from Kahutia Te Rangi, the legendary "whale rider." In every generation, a male heir has inherited the title of chief. Kahu is the chief's only great-grandchild, but he has no use for a girl. But when hundreds of whales beach themselves, Kahu reveals that she has the whale rider's ancient gift of communicating with whales.
168 pages, Grades 7 and up
related subjects:  New Zealand, Whales

In the months leading up to the August 1991 coup attempt that resulted in the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union, a young dancer with the Kirov Ballet struggles to decide whether to defect while on an upcoming trip to Paris.
224 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Russia, Poverty, Dancing

Part of the Royal Diaries series. Fourteen-year-old Sophia is engaged to the nephew of the Russian empress Elizabeth. She must travel to Russia where she is renamed Catherine and married, but she watches helplessly as her family is torn from her, her own mother is involved in a spying ring against the empress, and all that is familiar to her disappears.
176 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  18th Century, Princesses, Russia

In Leningrad in 1941, when Russia and Germany are at war, fourteen-year-old Georgi vows to help his family and his city during the terrible siege.
224 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Russia, World War II

In 1934, thirteen-year-old Marya and her younger brother, Georgi, set out alone on a long arduous journey into Siberia to find their mother after she and their father were exiled for opposing Stalin.
256 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Russia

In 1913 Russia, twelve-year-old Katya eagerly anticipates leaving her St. Petersburg home to join her mother, a lady in waiting in the household of Tsar Nicholas II, but the ensuing years bring world war, revolution, and undreamed of changes to her life.
304 pages, Grades 5 and up
related subjects:  Russia, World War I

Part of the Royal Diaries series. A novel in diary form in which the youngest daughter of Czar Nicholas II describes the privileged life her family led up until the time of World War I and the tragic events that befell them.
227 pages, Grades 4-7
related subjects:  Princesses, Russia, World War I

When Paul Faustino of LA NACION goes to interview El Gato, the phenomenal goalkeeper who single-handedly brought his team the World Cup, the reporter quickly learns that this will be no ordinary story. Instead, the legendary El Gato ("The Cat") tells a tale of the South American rain forest, where a ghostly mentor, the Keeper, teaches him the secrets of the game.
240 pages, Grades 8 and up
related subjects:  Soccer, South America

Chronicle of an expedition into the Llanganati Mountains of Ecuador in search of 750 tons of worked gold, which the Incas hid from the Spanish conquistadors after Pizarro executed the Sun King, Atahualpa.
48 pages, Grades 4 and up
related subjects:  South America

This book documents the true story of Long, a Vietnam War orphan, his struggle to survive in war-torn Vietnam, his dramatic escape to America as part of "Operation Babylift" during the last chaotic days before the fall of Saigon, and his life in the United States as "Matt," part of a loving Ohio family.
128 pages, Grades 6 and up
related subjects:  Vietnam, Refugees

Thirteen-year-old Mai and her family embark on a dangerous sea voyage from Vietnam to Hong Kong to escape the unpredictable and often brutal Vietnamese government.
144 pages, Grades 4 and up
related subjects:  Vietnam, Refugees