Rose Kent

First Edition 
Kimchi and calamari. It sounds like a quirky food fusion of Korean and Italian cuisine, and it's exactly how Joseph Calderaro feels about himself. Why wouldn't an adopted Korean drummer—comic book junkie feel like a combo platter given:

(1) his face in the mirror

(2) his proud Italian family.

And now Joseph has to write an essay about his ancestors for social studies. All he knows is that his birth family shipped his diapered butt on a plane to the USA. End of story. But what he writes leads to a catastrophe messier than a table of shattered dishes—and self-discovery that Joseph never could have imagined.

Grade level: 4 - 7
Ages 8 - 12+

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Maryland

A wide range of readers can relate to Joseph's story--those who are adopted, have mixed-race heritage, or those caught between their parents' culture and the culture where they live now.

Kimchi and Calamari

03319336-a56b-4f6b-81bb-5d1cd206d154-0

Jessica Kim

New York

One lie snowballs into a full-blown double life in this irresistible story about an aspiring stand-up comedian.

On the outside, Yumi Chung suffers from #shygirlproblems, a perm-gone-wrong, and kids calling her "Yu-MEAT" because she smells like her family's Korean barbecue restaurant. On the inside, Yumi is ready for her Netflix stand-up special. Her notebook is filled with mortifying memories that she's reworked into comedy gold. All she needs is a stage and courage.

Instead of spending the summer studying her favorite YouTube comedians, Yumi is enrolled in test-prep tutoring to qualify for a private school scholarship, which will help in a time of hardship at the restaurant. One day after class, Yumi stumbles on an opportunity that will change her life: a comedy camp for kids taught by one of her favorite YouTube stars. The only problem is that the instructor and all the students think she's a girl named Kay Nakamura--and Yumi doesn't correct them.

As this case of mistaken identity unravels, Yumi must decide to stand up and reveal the truth or risk losing her dreams and disappointing everyone she cares about.

Stand up, Yumi Chung!

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Shirley Climo

HC with dust jacket. DJ shows minimal wear. Ex-library with noted markings. Tight binding. Pages in very good condition 

California

In this version of Cinderella set in ancient Korea, Pear Blossom, a stepchild, eventually comes to be chosen by the magistrate to be his wife.

The Korean Cinderella

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Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

Louisiana

My Name Is Yoon

Alabama

Korean/English Dictionary

ROK/Military English Dictionary

Linda Sue Park

I have other books available by this author 

It's like the kite is part of him--the part that wants to fly.

In a riveting novel set in fifteenth-century Korea, two brothers discover a shared passion for kites. Kee-sup can craft a kite unequaled in strength and beauty, but his younger brother, Young-sup, can fly a kite as if he controlled the wind itself.

Their combined skills attract the notice of Korea's young king, who chooses Young-sup to fly the royal kite in the New Year kite-flying competition--an honor that is also an awesome responsibility. Although tradition decrees, and the boys' father insists, that the older brother represent the family, both brothers know that this time the family's honor is best left in Young-sup's hands.

This touching and suspenseful story, filled with the authentic detail and flavor of traditional Korean kite fighting, brings a remarkable setting vividly to life.

This moving historical novel is from Newbery Medalist Linda Sue Park, whose beloved middle grade books include A Single Shard and A Long Walk to Water.

The Kite Fighters

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Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

Julia Song and her friend Patrick want to team up to win a blue ribbon at the state fair, but they can't agree on the perfect project. ThenJulia's mother suggests they raise silkworms as she did years ago in Korea. The optimistic twosome quickly realizes that raising silkworms is a lot tougher than they thought. And Julia never suspected that she'd be discussing the fate of her and Patrick's project with Ms. Park, the author of this book!

Project Mulberry

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Marie Myung-Ok Lee

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

A sweeping, lyrical novel following a Korean immigrant pursuing the American dream who must confront the secrets of the past or risk watching the world he's worked so hard to build come crumbling down.

Dr. Yungman Kwak is in the twilight of his life. Every day for the last fifty years, he has brushed his teeth, slipped on his shoes, and headed to Horse Breath's General Hospital, where, as an obstetrician, he treats the women and babies of the small rural Minnesota town he chose to call home.

This was the life he longed for. The so-called American dream. He immigrated from Korea after the Korean War, forced to leave his family, ancestors, village, and all that he knew behind. But his life is built on a lie. And one day, a letter arrives that threatens to expose it.

Yungman's life is thrown into chaos--the hospital abruptly closes, his wife refuses to spend time with him, and his son is busy investing in a struggling health start-up. Yungman faces a choice--he must choose to hide his secret from his family and friends or confess and potentially lose all he's built. He begins to question the very assumptions on which his life is built--the so-called American dream, with the abject failure of its healthcare system, patient and neighbors who perpetuate racism, a town flawed with infrastructure, and a history that doesn't see him in it.

Toggling between the past and the present, Korea and America, Evening Hero is a sweeping, moving, darkly comic novel about a man looking back at his life and asking big questions about what is lost and what is gained when immigrants leave home for new shores.

The Evening Hero

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Eugenia Kim

A Novel

"A beautiful, deliberate and satisfying story spanning 30 years of Korean history . . . Elegant."--Publishers Weekly (starred review) In early-twentieth-century Korea, Najin Han, the privileged daughter of a calligrapher, longs to choose her own destiny, though her country--newly occupied by Japan--is crumbling, and her family, led by her stern father, is facing difficulties that seem insurmountable. Narrowly escaping an arranged marriage, Najin takes up a new role as a companion to a young princess. But the king is soon assassinated, and the centuries-old dynastic culture comes to its end. Najin pursues a coveted education and is surprised to find love. After one day of marriage a denied passport separates her from her new husband, who continues alone to America. As a decade passes and the world descends into war, Najin loses touch with her husband. Will the love they share be enough to sustain her through the deprivation her country continues to endure? The Calligrapher's Daughter is a richly drawn novel about a nation torn between ancient customs and modern possibilities, and is a "vivid, heartfelt portrait of faith, love and life for one family during a pivotal time in history" (Bookpage).

The Calligrapher's Daughter

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Min Jin Lee

Heavy Paperback (2 to 4 lbs)

Iowa

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST PACHINKO New York Times Book Review Editor's ChoiceNPR Fresh Air Top Ten Books of the YearUSA Today Top Ten Books of the YearThe Times (London) Top Ten Books of the Year In her critically acclaimed debut, National Book Award finalist Min Jin Lee introduces the indelible Casey Han: a strong-willed, Queens-bred daughter of Korean immigrants who is addicted to a glamorous Manhattan lifestyle she cannot afford. Fresh out of Princeton with an economics degree, no job, and a popular white boyfriend, Casey is determined to carve a space for herself in the glittering world she craves-but at what cost? Lee's bestselling, sharp-eyed, sweeping epic of love, greed, and hunger-set in a landscape where millionaires scramble for the free lunches the poor are too proud to accept-is an addictively readable, startlingly sympathetic portrait of intergenerational strife and immigrant struggle, exposing the intricate layers of a community clinging to its old ways in a city packed with haves and have-nots.

Free Food for Millionaires

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In the final days of World War II, Koreans were determined to take back control of their country from the Japanese and end the suffering caused by the Japanese occupation. As an eleven-year-old girl living with her Japanese family in northern Korea, Yoko is suddenly fleeing for her life with her mother and older sister, Ko, trying to escape to Japan, a country Yoko hardly knows.

Their journey is terrifying--and remarkable. It's a true story of courage and survival that highlights the plight of individual people in wartime. In the midst of suffering, acts of kindness, as exemplified by a family of Koreans who risk their own lives to help Yoko's brother, are inspiring reminders of the strength and resilience of the human spirit.

So Far from the Bamboo Grove

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Ellen Oh

For fans of Inside Out and Back Again and Amina's Voice comes a breathtaking story of family, hope, and survival from Ellen Oh, cofounder of We Need Diverse Books. When Junie Kim is faced with middle school racism, she learns of her grandparents' extraordinary strength and finds her voice. Inspired by her mother's real-life experiences during the Korean War, Oh's characters are real and riveting.

"Both unique and universal, timely and timeless." --Padma Venkatraman, Walter Award-winning author of The Bridge Home

"A moving story that highlights how to find courage in the face of unspeakable hardship." --Hena Khan, award-winning author of Amina's Voice

"Junie discovers where she comes from and gains the courage to make a difference in the future." --Wendy Wan-Long Shang, award-winning author of The Great Wall of Lucy Wu

Junie Kim just wants to fit in. So she keeps her head down and tries not to draw attention to herself. But when racist graffiti appears at her middle school, Junie must decide between staying silent or speaking out.

Then Junie's history teacher assigns a project and Junie decides to interview her grandparents, learning about their unbelievable experiences as kids during the Korean War. Junie comes to admire her grandma's fierce determination to overcome impossible odds, and her grandpa's unwavering compassion during wartime. And as racism becomes more pervasive at school, Junie taps into the strength of her ancestors and finds the courage to do what is right.

Finding Junie Kim is a reminder that within all of us lies the power to overcome hardship and emerge triumphant.

Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature Honor Book

A Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year

Included in NPR's 2021 Books We Love List

2021 Nerdy Award Winner

Finding Junie Kim

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Akira Toriyama

Is This the End?

Based on the much-beloved Dragon Ball manga, this series will introduce a whole new audience to the fantastic adventures of Goku and his friends. L to R (Western Style) Based on the much-beloved Dragon Ball manga, this series will introduce a whole new audience to the fantastic adventures of Goku and his friends. Dragon Ball introduces a young monkey-tailed boy named Goku, whose quiet life changes when he meets Bulma, a girl who is on a quest to collect seven "Dragon Balls." If she gathers them all, an incredibly powerful dragon will appear and grant her one wish. But the precious orbs are scattered all over the world, and Bulma could use the help of a certain super-strong boy...!

Dragon Ball: Is This The End? Chapter Book, Vol. 9n

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#hardcover #school #dreams #fabuloso #marieglee #minnesota #Korean #hockey Book does have library binding but otherwise in great condition!

Minnesota

The sky had not yet begun to lighten, and Jin-Ha could see hard fingers of frost pressing on her window, outlined by the light from the streetlamp. She wanted to stay in her warm bed and never come out. Being cold -- and knowing you were going to be even colder before you got any warmer -- was the worst feeling. Then she remembered her dream. Then she remembered her math test. Now she wanted to jump out of bed and onto the first bus out of town. How else to cop with this terrible thing she had done? She failed a math test and a quiz and she had lied to her parents. Lying to her parents had been ten times worse than telling them the truth: telling the truth would have gotten the unpleasant newsover with right away. By lying she was only postponing the agony. Everything only seemed all right; underneath, it was all wrong. All WRONG.

F Is for Fabuloso

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Maurene Goo

Illinois

Back to the Future meets The Joy Luck Club in this YA contemporary romance about a Korean American girl sent back to the '90s to (reluctantly) help her teenage mom win Homecoming Queen.

Being a first-generation Asian American immigrant is hard. You know what's harder? Being the daughter of one. Samantha Kang has never gotten along with her mother, Priscilla--and has never understood her bougie-nightmare, John Hughes high school expectations. After a huge fight between them, Sam is desperate to move forward--but instead, finds herself thrown back. Way back.

To her shock, Sam finds herself back in high school . . . in the '90s . . . with a 17-year-old Priscilla. Now this Gen Z girl must try to fit into an analog world. She's got the fashion down, but everything else is baffling. What is "microfiche"? What's with the casual racism and misogyny? And why does it feel like Priscilla is someone she could actually be . . . friends with?

Sam's blast to the past has her finding the right romance in the wrong time while questioning everything she thought she knew about her mom . . . and herself. Will Sam figure out what she needs to do to fix things for her mom so that she can go back to a time she understands? Brimming with heart and humor, Maurene Goo's time-travel romance asks big questions about what exactly one inherits and loses in the immigrant experience. 




Throwback

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New Jersey

The Band 

Kim Bo-young

Oklahoma

And Other Stories

"Her fiction is a breath-taking piece of a cinematic art itself. Reminiscent of the world we experienced in Matrix, Inception, and Dark City, still it leads us to this entirely original structure, which is a ground-breaking, mystic literary and cinematic experience. Indeed, powerful and graceful."--Bong Joon-ho, Oscar-winning director of Parasite In this mind-expanding work of speculative fiction, available in English for the first time, one of South Korea's most treasured writers explores the driving forces of humanity--love, hope, creation, destruction, and the very meaning of existence--in two pairs of thematically interconnected stories. Two worlds, four stories, infinite possibilities In "I'm Waiting for You" and "On My Way," an engaged couple coordinate their separate missions to distant corners of the galaxy to ensure--through relativity--they can arrive back on Earth simultaneously to make it down the aisle. But small incidents wreak havoc on space and time, driving their wedding date further away. As centuries on Earth pass and the land and climate change, one thing is constant: the desire of the lovers to be together. In two separate yet linked stories, Kim Bo-Young cleverly demonstrate the idea love that is timeless and hope springs eternal, despite seemingly insurmountable challenges and the deepest despair. In "The Prophet of Corruption" and "That One Life," humanity is viewed through the eyes of its creators: godlike beings for which everything on Earth--from the richest woman to a speck of dirt--is an extension of their will. When one of the creations questions the righteousness of this arrangement, it is deemed a perversion--a disease--that must be excised and cured. Yet the Prophet Naban, whose "child" is rebelling, isn't sure the rebellion is bad. What if that which is considered criminal is instead the natural order--and those who condemn it corrupt? Exploring the dichotomy between the philosophical and the corporeal, Kim ponders the fate of free-will, as he considers the most basic of questions: who am I?

I'm Waiting for You

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Pennsylvania

A dazzling work of historical fiction about two women who seem the most unlikely to ever meet: Alice, a Korean war survivor and translator for the American forces in Seoul and Marilyn Monroe, who is visiting Korea on a four-day USO tour. February 1954. Although the Korean War armistice was signed a year ago, most citizens of Seoul still battle to return to some semblance of normalcy. Conditions are dismal. Children beg for food, and orphanages are teeming. Alice J. Kim, a Korean translator and typist for the American forces still sanctioned in the city, yearns for the life she used to live before her country was torn apart. Then Alice’s boss makes an announcement—the American movie star Marilyn Monroe will be visiting Korea on a four-day USO tour, and Alice has been chosen as her translator. Though intrigued, Alice has few expectations of the job—what could she and a beautiful actress at the peak of her fame possibly have to talk about? Yet the Marilyn she meets, while just as dazzling and sensual as Alice expected, is also surprisingly approachable. As Marilyn’s visit unfolds, Alice is forced into a reckoning with her own painful past. Moving and mesmerizing, The Starlet and the Spy is a beautiful portrayal of unexpected kinship between two very different women, and of the surprising connections that can change, or even save, a life.

The Starlet and the Spy (1st US Edition, 2019)

39deb8bd-8526-4365-8e03-ddfda66670b2-1

Talia Tucker

Florida

Booksmart meets Never Have I Ever in this debut YA rom-com about two Korean American teens forced into a shared college visit road trip where they discover that the reasons they’ve been rivals their entire lives might actually be signs they’re a perfect pair. Winter Park and Bobby Bae are Korean American high school juniors whose families have been friends since the kids were making crayon art. They, however, are repulsed by each other. Winter is MIT-bound, comfortable keeping people at arm’s length, and known by others as responsible, though she has a desire to let loose. This probably comes from her rebel grandmother, who is constantly pushing boundaries and encouraging Winter to do so as well. Winter’s best friend is moving abroad and won’t be attending college at all, and Winter’s wrestling with what it means to be left behind. Bobby is as Type-A, anxious, and risk-averse as you can get. He’s also been recently dumped, which has him feeling disoriented and untethered. That’s why, when Winter’s and Bobby’s parents insist that they go on a northeast college campus tour together, both teens find reasons to accept even though the thought of being stuck in a car together for 700 miles sounds unbearable. What awaits them is a journey of self-discovery where the only rule on their road trip is to break all the rules. At first, this happens in hilariously calculated ways (using lists and reason and logic!), but they soon abandon that, challenging each other to dares in Virginia, getting high and wandering Philly for food—and battling the subsequent digestive distress—and crashing a party in Cambridge. And, of course, realizing that they’re perfect together.

Rules for Rule Breaking

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Ki Dong Kim

Name stamped on inside page - library stamp on inside page 

Texas

Broken and Poured Out: A Korean's Journey with Jesus

Semone

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Kyung-sook Shin

An American release of an award-winning South Korean best-seller follows the efforts of a family to find the mother who went missing from Seoul Station and their sobering realizations when they recall memories that suggest she may not have been happy. Reprint.

Please Look after Mom

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Sheri Holman

Arizona

Princess of the Moon and Stars

THE ROYAL DIARIES is pleased to introduce historical novelist, Sheri Holman, who makes her debut on the list with a captivating story of fourteen-year-old Princess Sondok from seventh-century Korea. During the seventh-century, the land which is now Korea was fraught with political and religious intrigue. The country was split into Three Kingdoms, each fighting for supremacy: Silla, Koguryo, and Paekche. Besides the warring kingdoms, there are three religions in conflict: Shamanism, the ancient female-dominated faith wherein Shamanist priestesses wield great power at court, foretelling the future, performing important national rituals, and healing sickness; Buddhism, the contemplative State religion; and Confucianism, a recent import from powerful China.

Sondok

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An Illustrated Memoir

A powerful and moving teen graphic novel memoir about immigration, belonging, and how arts can save a life--perfect for fans of American Born Chinese and Hey, Kiddo. For as long as she can remember, it's been Robin and her mom against the world. Growing up as the only child of a single mother in Seoul, Korea, wasn't always easy, but it has bonded them fiercely together. So when a vacation to visit friends in Huntsville, Alabama, unexpectedly becomes a permanent relocation--following her mother's announcement that she's getting married--Robin is devastated. Overnight, her life changes. She is dropped into a new school where she doesn't understand the language and struggles to keep up. She is completely cut off from her friends in Seoul and has no access to her beloved comics. At home, she doesn't fit in with her new stepfamily, and worst of all, she is furious with the one person she is closest to--her mother. Then one day Robin's mother enrolls her in a local comic drawing class, which opens the window to a future Robin could never have imagined.

Almost American Girl

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Please look carefully at pictures before buying, edition has side by side English and Korean text.
In very very good condition, just a bit of yellowing on the sides.


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Rose Kent

Kimchi and Calamari

Jessica Kim

Stand up, Yumi Chung!

Shirley Climo; Illustrated by Ruth Heller

The Korean Cinderella

Helen Recorvis

My Name Is Yoon

Cpt. Young C. Lim

ROK/Military English Dictionary

Linda Sue Park

The Kite Fighters

Linda Sue Park

Project Mulberry

Marie Myung-Ok Lee

The Evening Hero

Eugenia Kim

The Calligrapher's Daughter

Min Jin Lee

Free Food for Millionaires

Yoko Kawashima Watkins

So Far from the Bamboo Grove

Ellen Oh

Finding Junie Kim

Akira Toriyama

Dragon Ball: Is This The End? Chapter Book, Vol. 9n

Marie G. Lee

F Is for Fabuloso

Maurene Goo

Throwback

Christine Ma-Kellams

The Band

Kim Bo-young

I'm Waiting for You

Ji Min Lee; Chi Young Kim (translator)

The Starlet and the Spy (1st US Edition, 2019)

Talia Tucker

Rules for Rule Breaking

Ki Dong Kim

Semone

Kyung-sook Shin

Please Look after Mom

Sheri Holman

Sondok

Robin Ha (Illustrator)

Almost American Girl

Gideons

New Testament with Psalms