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Young Adult Fiction By Lensey Namioka |
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| I wrote these books for young adult readers. Most are action packed, and some have a little romance, but all feature strong characters who have to make important choices. In choosing, they find out something important about themselves. |
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Mismatch
Sue Hua is fifteen, and just moved from multiracial Seattle to a white-bread suburb, where she feels like the only Asian for miles. Then she meets Andy, a handsome Asian-American violinist. Sue and Andy hit it off, and their friends think they're made for each other.
There's only one problem. Sue's family is Chinese-American, and Andy's is Japanese-American. The difference doesn't mean anything to their friends, but to Sue's and Andy's parents it means everything. How much loyalty do Sue and Andy owe to their families, and how much to their own hearts?
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Half and Half
Fiona Cheng is half and half: her father is Chinese and her mother is Scottish.
Fiona looks more like her father, so people expect her to be more interested
in her Chinese half.
Lately, even Fiona’s confused about who she is.
When her grandparents on both sides come to town, the situation gets even worse.
Fiona wants to dance with her Scottish grandfather’s folk dancing troupe.
But whoever saw a Chinese girl dancing the Highland Reel?
Fiona thinks of ways to make herself look more Scottish.
But she doesn’t want her family to think she’s trying to hide her Chinese half.
Everyone seems to expect different things from Fiona.
So maybe doing something totally unexpected is the only answer.
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Ties That Bind, Ties That Break
When her father and her uncle discuss the "Foreign Big Noses" Ailin is fascinated. Who are these people
who speak English, and why have they come to China? A Third Sister
in the Tao family, Ailin, is not quite five years old in 1922, a time of
transformation in China, when Western philosophies are creating a wave
of revolutions and the empire is crumbling. Ailin rebels against
the age-old tradition of feet binding, but this causes her intended husband's
family to break the marriage agreement. Ailin realizes just how powerless
a girl of good family with no prospect of marriage is in Chinese Society.
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An Ocean Apart, a World Away
Since Yanyan was twelve, she has been fascinated by both Western medicine and traditional Chinese medicine,
and is determined to become a doctor. But in China in 1921, it is unusual for a woman to attend University,
let alone medical school.
While most sixteen-year-old girls are planning their weddings, Yanyan has no interest at all in marriage.
But that is before she meets a young man named Baoshu. An outstanding scholar and martial arts student,
Baoshu is passionate and dangerous, and loves a challenge as much as Yanyan does.
Yanyan leaves China to study medicine in America, but she has not seen the last of Baoshu!
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April and the Dragon Lady
April Chen is a Chinese-American teenager. She lives in Seattle with her father, her brother, and her Grandma, the "Dragon Lady." She's happily planning to go away to college, and she has a great new boyfriend. But as the only daughter in a traditional Chinese Family, April is responsible for Grandma, and Grandma has other plans.
The closer April gets to graduation, the more Grandma's needs seem to escalate. Torn between the expectations of her traditional Chinese culture and her very American desire for self-fulfillment, April, like all young people, must find a way to define herself on her own terms.
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Who's Hu?
Who's Hu? A question Hu herself would like to answer. Chinese-American by birth, Hu is faced with not only the difficulties imposed by her different skin color and nationality but with the normal problems of growing up female in America. Her parents impose their mores upon Hu: why date Americans when Chinese boys are so much nicer? Hu is caught in the middle, wanting to not only please her parents, but also to belong.
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