We can learn about other countries, cultures, races, and religions, by reading

Native-

American Middle East

Africa

Holocaust

African-

American

India

China

Afghanistan

PakistanJapan

Korea

ThailandHispanic

Esperanza Rising

By Pam Muñoz Ryan

Esperanza and her mother

are forced to leave their life

of wealth and privilege in

Mexico to go work in the

labor camps of Southern

California, where they must

adapt to the harsh

circumstances facing

Mexican farm workers on the

eve of the Great Depression.

Cuba 15

By Nancy Osa

Violet Paz has just turned

15, a pivotal birthday in

the eyes of her Cuban

grandmother. Fifteen is

the age when a girl enters

womanhood, traditionally

celebrating the occasion

with a quinceañero. But

while Violet is half Cuban,

she’s also half Polish, and

more importantly, she

feels 100% American.

Because her mother

wants her to be part

of the world of high

society in their native

Puerto Rico, nine-

year-old Teresa

attends a private

school but loses her

best friend.

In the Shade of the Nispero TreeBy Carmen T. Bernier-Grand

A young girl living in

a Hispanic

neighborhood in

Chicago ponders

the advantages and

disadvantages of

her environment

and evaluates her

relationships with

family and friends.

The House on Mango StreetBy Sandra Cisneros

A Girl Named Disaster

By Nancy Farmer

While journeying to Zimbabwe,

eleven-year-old Nhamo struggles

to escape drowning and

starvation and in so doing comes

close to the mysterious world of

the African spirits.

Second Daughter: The Story of a Slave Girl

By Mildred Pitts Walter

In late eighteenth-century

Massachusetts, Aissa, the

fictional younger sister of

Elizabeth Freeman,

relates how her sister

gains freedom for herself

and her family by bringing

a suit against their owner

in court.

Numbering All the Bones

By Ann Rinaldi

Thirteen-year-old Eulinda, a

house slave on a Georgia

plantation in 1864, turns to Clara

Barton, the eventual founder of

the American Red Cross, for

help in finding her brother

Neddy who ran away to join the

Northern war effort and is

rumored to be at Andersonville

Prison.

Lizzie Bright and the

Buckminster Boy

By Gary D. Schmidt

In 1911, Turner Buckminster

hates his new home in

Maine, but things improve

when he meets Lizzie Bright

Griffin, a girl from a poor,

nearby island community

founded by former slaves

that Turner’s dad and other

town leaders want to change

into a tourist spot.

After being sold to a

cruel couple in New York

City, a slave named

Isabel spies for the

rebels during the

Revolutionary War.

Chains

By Laurie Halse Anderson

Born Confused

By Tanuja Desai Hidier

Dimple's parents are from

India, and she has spent

years rebelling against

their customs. Now

everything from India is

hip--even her best friend

wears a bindi dot as an

accessory. She also

resents her parents

setting her up with a

"suitable" boy. Their first

meeting is a disaster. But

when they meet again in a

club where he's the DJ,

Dimple suddenly finds him

suitable because of his

sheer unsuitability.

Shiva’s Fire

By Suzanne Fisher

Staples

In India, a talented

dancer sacrifices

friends and family

for her art.

Lowji Discovers America

By Candace Fleming

“To be honest, I am more

than a little sad,” says nine-

year-old Lowji after he

moves with his parents from

Bombay to an apartment in

tiny Hamlet, Illinois. It's

summer, the local kids are

hard to meet, and Lowji

longs for a pet to keep him

company.

Homeless Bird

When thirteen-year-old Koly enters into a bad arranged

marriage, she must either suffer a destiny dictated by

India's tradition or find the courage to oppose it.

By Gloria Whelan

When her grandparents

come for a visit from

India to California,

thirteen-year-old Sunita

finds herself resenting

her Indian heritage and

embarrassed by the

differences she feels

between herself and

her friends.

The Not-So-Star-Spangled Life of Sunita Sen

By Mitali Perkins

Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind

By Suzanne Fisher Staples

Eleven-year old

Shabanu,the daughter of

a nomad in Pakistan, is

pledged to marry an

older man for money and

must either accept the

decision or risk the

consequences of defying

her father's wishes.

Adapted for young

readers, Greg Mortenson's

novel in which he recounts

the experiences he had

while trying to help

impoverished villages in

Pakistan's Karakoram

Himalaya building schools

for their children.

Three Cups of Tea

By Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

Adapted for Young Readers by Sarah Thomson

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.

The Breadwinner

By Deborah Ellis

The Shadows of

Ghadames

By Joëlle Stolz

At the end of the nineteenth

century in Libya, eleven-

year-old Malika both enjoys

and feels held back by the

narrow world of women, but

an injured stranger enters

her home and disrupts the

traditional order of things.

Kiss the Dust

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.

By Elizabeth Laird

The Beduins’ GazelleBy Frances Temple

In 1302, two

cousins of the

nomadic Beni

Khalid tribe who

are engaged

become separated

by political

intrigue between

warring tribes.

Number the Stars

By Lois Lowry

In 1943, during the German occupation of Denmark,

ten-year-old Annemarie learns how to be brave and

courageous when she helps shelter her Jewish friend

from the Nazis.

The Island on Bird Street

By Uri Olev

During World War II, a

Jewish boy is left on his

own for months in a ruined

house in the Warsaw

Ghetto, where he must

learn all the tricks of

survival under constantly

life-threatening conditions.

Shadow of the Wall

By Christa Laird

Living with his mother

and two sisters in the

Warsaw Ghetto, Misha

is befriended by the

director of the

orphanage, Dr.

Korczak, and finds a

purpose to his life

when he joins a

resistance

organization.

The Ransom of Mercy Carter

By Caroline B. Cooney

In 1704, in the English

settlement of Deerfield,

Massachusetts, eleven-year-

old Mercy and her family and

neighbors are captured by

Mohawk Indians and their

French friends, and forced to

march through bitter cold to

French Canada, where some

adapt to new lives and some

still hope to be ransomed.

The Sign of the Beaver

By Elizabeth George Speare

Left alone to guard the family's

wilderness home in eighteenth-

century Maine, a boy is hard-

pressed to survive until local

Indians teach him their skills.

Julie of the Wolves

By Jean Craighead George

While running away from home and an unwanted

marriage, a thirteen-year-old Eskimo girl becomes lost

on the North Slope of Alaska and is befriended by a

wolf pack.

Island of the Blue Dolphins

By Scott O’Dell

Left alone on a beautiful

but isolated island off the

coast of California, a

young Indian girl spends

eighteen years, not only

surviving through her

enormous courage and

self-reliance, but also

finding a measure of

happiness in her solitary

life.

Sees Behind Trees

A Native American boy with a special gift to "see"

beyond his poor eyesight journeys with an old warrior to

a land of mystery and beauty.

By Michael Dorris

Hidden Roots

By Joseph Bruchac

Although he is uncertain why

his father is so angry and

what secret his mother is

keeping from him, eleven-

year-old Sonny knows that

he is different from his

classmates in their small

New York town.

Chu Ju’s House

By Gloria Whelan

In order to save her baby

sister, fourteen-year-old

Chu Ju leaves her rural

home in modern China and

earns food and shelter by

working on a sampan,

tending silk worms, and

planting rice seedlings,

while wondering if she will

ever see her family again.

The Kite Rider

By Geraldine McCaughren

In thirteenth-century China,

after trying to save his

widowed mother from a

horrendous second

marriage, twelve-year-old

Haoyou has life-changing

adventures when he takes

to the sky as a circus kite

rider and ends up meeting

the great Mongol ruler

Kublai Khan.

Dragon’s Gate

By Laurence Yep

Otter has always dreamed

of joining his father and

his uncle in America

building the

transcontinental railroad.

When he joins the crew

and experiences the

hardships, his hopes are

crushed and he must

discover a way to

recapture his dreams for a

better life.

Bound

By Donna Jo Napoli

In a novel based on Chinese

Cinderella tales, fourteen-

year-old stepchild Xing-Xing

endures a life of neglect

and servitude, as her

stepmother cruelly

mutilates her own child's

feet so that she alone might

marry well.

The House of Sixty Fathers

By Meindert DeJong

Alone in a sampan with

his pig and three

ducklings, a little Chinese

boy is whirled down a

raging river back to the

town from which he and

his parents had escaped

from the invading

Japanese, and spends

long and frightening days

regaining his family and

new home.

A Single Shard

By Linda Sue Park

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.

When My Name Was Keoko

By Linda Sue Park

With national pride and

occasional fear, a brother

and sister face the

increasingly oppressive

occupation of Korea by

Japan during World War II,

which threatens to

suppress Korean culture

entirely.

F Is For Fabuloso

By Marie G. Lee

Seventh grader Jin-Ha finds her adjustment to life in

America complicated by her mother's difficulty in

learning to speak English.

The Long Season of Rain

By Helen Kim

When an orphan

boy comes to live

with her family,

eleven-year-old

Junehee begins to

realize that the

demands placed

on Korean women

can destroy their

lives.

Kira-Kira

By Cynthia Kadohata

Chronicles the close

friendship between two

Japanese-American sisters

growing up in rural Georgia

during the late 1950s and

early 1960s, and the

despair when one sister

becomes terminally ill.

1001 Cranes

By Naomi Hirahara

With her parents on the verge

of separating, a devastated

twelve-year-old Japanese

American girl spends the

summer in Los Angeles with

her grandparents, where she

folds paper cranes into

wedding displays, becomes

involved with a young

skateboarder, and learns how

complicated relationships can

be.

Blue Fingers: A Ninja’s Tale

By Cheryl Aylward Whitesel

Having failed apprenticeship as a

dye maker, Koji is captured and

forced to train as a ninja, where

he remains disloyal until he

discovers samurai have burned

his former village.

Twelve-year-old Ben

Uchida keeps a journal

of his experiences as

a prisoner in a

Japanese internment

camp in Apple Valley,

California, during

World War II.

The Journal of Ben Uchida:

Citizen 13559 Mirror Lake

Internment Camp

By Barry Dennenberg

Rice Without Rain

By Minfong Ho

After social rebels convince the headman of a small village

in northern Thailand to resist the land rent, his seventeen-

year-old daughter Jinda finds herself caught up in the

student uprising in Bangkok.

Silk Umbrellas

By Carolyn Marsden

Eleven-year-old Noi

worries that she will

have to stop painting the

silk umbrellas her family

sells at the market near

their Thai village and be

forced to join her older

sister in difficult work at

a local factory instead.

After ten years in a refugee

camp in Thailand, thirteen-

year-old Mai Yang travels to

Providence, Rhode Island,

where her Americanized

cousins introduce her to

pizza, shopping, and beer,

while her grandmother and

new friends keep her

connected to her Hmong

heritage.

Tangled Threads: A Hmong Girl’s Story

By Pegi Deitz Shea

Ask Me No Questions

By Marina Budhos

Fourteen-year-old

Nadira, her sister, and

their parents leave

Bangladesh for New

York City, but the

expiration of their visas

and the events of

September 11, 2001,

bring frustration, sorrow,

and terror for the whole

family.

Children of the River

By Linda Crew

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.

Elephant Run

By Roland SmithNick endures servitude,

beatings, and more after his

British father's plantation in

Burma is invaded by the

Japanese in 1941, and when

his father and others are

taken prisoner and Nick is

stranded with his friend Mya,

they plan a daring escape on

elephants, risking their lives

to save Nick's father and

Mya's brother from a

Japanese prisoner of war

camp.

Camel Rider

By Prue Mason

Two expatriates living in a

Middle Eastern country,

twelve-year-old Adam from

Australia and Walid from

Bangladesh, must rely on one

another when war breaks out

and they find themselves in the

desert, both trying to reach the

same city with no water, little

food, and no common

language.

How can you find a multicultural book

in our library?

Search our OPAC!

Check the Jericho Public Library

Use the online catalog for Nassau County libraries:

http://www.alisweb.org