Books From Around the World (YA): Asia

It’s often interesting to get a different perspective on the world. Here are some books set in some far-flung places – and some places close to home – grouped by continent/large body of water with islands in it. The books on this list are (mostly) written by authors from the countries they are about, and in many cases have been translated into English from their mother tongues (the book we’ve chosen for Madagascar, Return to the enchanted island by Johary Ravaloson, is only the second book to have ever been translated from Malagasy into English!).

Not all of the books are in the Young Adult collection, but we’ve tried to make sure that they all at least feature kids or teens in prominent places in the story. Our eventual goal is to have at least one book for every country in the world! Help us out by sending in recommendations if you’ve found one we’ve missed!

This list contains books written by authors from Asia. Check out our lists for authors from Africa, Europe, North and Central America, Oceania, and South America for even more recommendations!

Updated June 19, 2024
Drag items up and down to your preferred order then select the "Save Order" button.
All my rage
Tahir, Sabaa
Paper Book
National Book Award WINNER Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature WINNER An INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! An INSTANT INDIE BESTSELLER! A Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Book of the Century "All My Rage is a love story,...

Pakistan | Pakistani-American author

Earth and ashes
Rahimi, Atiq.
Paper Book
When the Soviet army arrives in Afghanistan, the elderly Dastaguir witnesses the destruction of his village and the death of his clan. His young grandson Yassin, deaf from the sounds of the bombing, is one of the few survivors. The two set out through an unforgiving landscape, searching for the...

Afghanistan | Afghan author

Patron saints of nothing
Ribay, Randy
Paper Book
A NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST * A powerful coming-of-age story about grief, guilt, and the risks a Filipino-American teenager takes to uncover the truth about his cousin's murder. A Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Book of the Century "Brilliant, honest, and...

Philippines | Filipino author

The three-body problem
Liu, Cixin.
Paper Book
The inspiration for the Netflix series 3 Body Problem! WINNER OF THE HUGO AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL Over 1 million copies sold in North America "A mind-bending epic."--The New York Times * "War of the Worlds for...

China | Chinese author

Thirst
Bajaj, Varsha
Paper Book
A New York Times Bestseller The riveting story of a heroic girl who fights for her belief that water should be for everyone. Minni lives in the poorest part of Mumbai, where access to water is limited to a few hours a day and the communal taps have long lines....

India | Indian author

The henna wars
Jaigirdar, Adiba
Paper Book
"Impossible to put down." - Kirkus, starred review Nishat doesn't want to lose her family, but she also doesn't want to hide who she is, and it only gets harder once a childhood friend walks back into her life. Flávia is beautiful and charismatic, and Nishat falls for...

Bangladesh | Bangladeshi-Irish author

The love & lies of Rukhsana Ali
Khan, Sabina
Paper Book
With a welcome mix of humor, heart, and high-stakes drama, Sabina Khan provides a timely and honest portrait of what it's like to grow up feeling unwelcome in your own culture. Fight for love. Fight for family. Fight for yourself. Seventeen-year-old Rukhsana Ali...

Bangladesh | Bangladeshi-Canadian author

In the shadow of the banyan
Ratner, Vaddey.
Paper Book
Told from the tender perspective of a young girl who comes of age amid the Cambodian killing fields, this searing first novel--based on the author's personal story--has been hailed by Little Bee author Chris Cleave as "a masterpiece...utterly heartbreaking and impossibly beautiful."

Cambodia | Khmer-American author

The mountains sing : a novel
Nguye??n, Phan Que?? Mai
Paper Book
The International Bestseller A New York Times Editors' Choice Selection A Winner of the 2020 Lannan Literary Awards Fellowship A Best Book of 2020: NPR's Book Concierge * PopMatters * Washington Independent...

Vietnam | Vietnamese author

First they killed my father : a daughter of Cambodia remembers
Ung, Loung.
Paper Book
One of seven children of a high-ranking government official, Loung Ung lived a privileged life in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh until the age of five. Then, in April 1975, Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge army stormed into the city, forcing Ung's family to flee and, eventually, to disperse. Loung was...

Cambodia | Khmer-American author

Chinese Cinderella : the true story of an unwanted daughter
Mah, Adeline Yen
Paper Book
A riveting memoir of a girl's painful coming-of-age in a wealthy Chinese family during the 1940s. A Chinese proverb says, Falling leaves return to their roots. In Chinese Cinderella, Adeline Yen Mah returns to her roots to tell the story of her painful childhood and her ultimate triumph and...

China | Chinese-American author

Hard by a great forest
Vardiashvili, Leo
Paper Book
ONE OF NPR's "BOOKS WE LOVE" 2024 NAMED ONE OF THE OBSERVER'S 10 BEST NEW NOVELISTS FOR 2024 "The stakes could barely be higher in Leo Vardiashvili's propulsive page-turner...It's a spellbinding achievement."--The Financial Times "Has a...

Georgia | Georgian author

Night of the raven, dawn of the dove
Mehrotra, Rati
Paper Book
In Rati Mehrotra's YA fantasy novel Night of the Raven, Dawn of the Dove, a young guardswoman struggles with her unwitting role as a major pawn in the deadly games between two kingdoms in a monster-infested alternate medieval India. Bound to the queen of Chandela by a...

India | Indian-Canadian author

Q & A : a novel
Swarup, Vikas.
Paper Book
Vikas Swarup's spectacular debut, which provided the inspiration for the award-winning film Slumdog Millionaire, is a page-turning and beguiling story of love, perseverance, and drama. Vikas Swarup's remarkable debut novel opens in a jail cell in Mumbai, India, where Ram...

India | Indian author

Everything sad is untrue : (a true story)
Nayeri, Daniel
Paper Book
At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls 'Daniel') stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny; who makes things up...

Iran | Iranian-American author

The enlightenment of the greengage tree
Azar, Shokoofeh
Paper Book
LONGLISTED for the 2021 PEN TRANSLATION PRIZE LONGLISTED for the 2020 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD for Translated Literature FINALIST for the 2020 INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE From the pen of one of Iran's rising literary stars, The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree is a family story...

Iran | Iranian author

Darius the Great is not okay
Khorram, Adib
Paper Book
Darius doesn't think he'll ever be enough, in America or in Iran. Hilarious and heartbreaking, this unforgettable debut introduces a brilliant new voice in contemporary YA. Winner of the William C. Morris Debut Award "Heartfelt, tender, and so utterly real. I'd live...

Iran | Iranian-American author

Censoring an Iranian love story : a novel
Mandanipour, Shahriar.
Paper Book
From one of Iran’s most acclaimed and controversial contemporary writers, his first novel to appear in English—a dazzlingly inventive work of fiction that opens a revelatory window onto what it’s like to live, to love, and to be an artist in today’s Iran. The...

Iran | Iranian author

Persepolis
Satrapi, Marjane
Paper Book
A New York Times Notable Book A Time Magazine “Best Comix of the Year” A San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times Best-seller Wise, funny, and heartbreaking, Persepolis is Marjane Satrapi’s memoir of growing up in...

Iran | Iranian author

Lola : a ghost story
Torres, J.
Paper Book
J. Torres and Elbert Or celebrate 10 years of Lola: AGhost Story, the critically-acclaimed graphic novel that explores family, griefand Filipino folklore in an all-new edition that includes a revised ending andupdated illustrations.

Philippines | Filipino-Canadian author

The cat who saved books : a novel
Natsukawa, So?suke
Paper Book
AN INDIE NEXT PICK! From the #1 bestselling author in Japan comes a celebration of books, cats, and the people who love them, infused with the heartwarming spirit of The Guest Cat and The Travelling Cat Chronicles. Bookish high school student Rintaro Natsuki is about to close the...

Japan | Japanese author

Wandering son. Volume one
Shimura, Takako
Paper Book
In the first of eight volumes, readers are introduced to fifth gradersShuichi Nitori and his new friend Yoshino Takatsuki. They have happy homes,loving families, and are well liked by their classmates. But they share a secretthat further complicates the already-complicated verge of puberty:...

Japan | Japanese author

Black water sister
Cho, Zen
Paper Book
A finalist for the 2022 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel One of BookPage's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of 2021 One of Tor.com Reviewers' Choice Best Books of 2021 One of Book Riot's Best SFF Standalones of 2021 "Ghosts. Gods....

Malaysia | Malaysian author

The night tiger
Choo, Yangsze
Paper Book
The Reese Witherspoon x Hello Sunshine Book Club Pick INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "A sumptuous garden maze of a novel that immerses readers in a complex, vanished world." --Kirkus (starred review) An utterly transporting...

Malaysia | Malaysian author

The weight of our sky
Hanna Alkaf
Paper Book
A music loving teen with OCD does everything she can to find her way back to her mother during the historic race riots in 1969 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in this heart-pounding literary debut. Melati Ahmad looks like your typical movie-going, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old....

Malaysia | Malaysian author

The girl with seven names : escape from North Korea
Lee, Hyeonseo
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER An extraordinary insight into life under one of the world's most ruthless and secretive dictatorships - and the story of one woman's terrifying struggle to avoid capture/repatriation and guide her family to freedom. As a child growing up in...

North Korea | North Korean author

Without you, there is no us : my time with the sons of North Korea's elite
Kim, Suki
Paper Book
A haunting account of teaching English to the sons of North Korea's ruling class during the last six months of Kim Jong-il's reign   Every day, three times a day, the students march in two straight lines, singing praises to Kim Jong-il and North Korea: Without you, there is no...

North Korea | South Korean-American author writing on her experiences living and teaching English in Pyongyang in 2011.

Celestial bodies
rith , J khah
Paper Book
This winner of the 2019 Man Booker International Prize and national bestseller is "an innovative reimagining of the family saga . . . Celestial Bodies is itself a treasure house: an intricately calibrated chaos of familial orbits and conjunctions, of the gravitational pull of...

Oman | Omani author

My heart underwater
Fantauzzo, Laurel Flores
Paper Book
Fans of Adib Khorram and Randy Ribay will love this coming-of-age debut about a Filipina American teen drowning under pressure and learning to trust her heart.  Corazon Tagubio is an outcast at the Catholic school she attends on scholarship. Her crush on her teacher, Ms....

Philippines | Filipina author

I guess I live here now
Ahn, Claire
Paper Book
Seoul, Korea. In this glittering city where the latest trends are born, Melody finds herself swept away by luxury, romance, and family drama... but is this a place she could ever call home? Thanks to a tiny transgression after school one day, Melody is shocked...

South Korea | South Korean author

The Noh family
Shim, Grace
Paper Book
This sparkling K-drama inspired debut novel introduces irrepressibly charming teen Chloe Chang, who is reunited with her deceased father's estranged family via a DNA test, and is soon whisked off to Seoul to join them... When her friends gift her a 23-and-Me test as a gag, high...

South Korea | South Korean-American author

The astonishing color of after
Pan, Emily X. R
Paper Book
A Time Magazine 100 Best YA Books of All Time Selection A stunning, heartbreaking debut novel about grief, love, and family, perfect for fans of Jandy Nelson and Celeste Ng. Leigh Chen Sanders is absolutely certain about one thing: When...

Taiwan | Taiwanese-American author

Loveboat, Taipei
Wen, Abigail Hing
Paper Book
An instant New York Times bestseller and Indie bestseller! Now adapted for the screen! Catch Love in Taipei, starring Ashley Liao (Physical, Fresh Off the Boat), Ross Butler (To All the Boys I've Loved Before franchise, Shazam!), Nico Hiraga (Booksmart), and Chelsea Zhang (Daybreak), now...

Taiwan | Chinese-American author

10 minutes 38 seconds in this strange world
Shafak, Elif
Paper Book
Shortlisted for the 2019 Booker Prize Named a Best Book of the Year by Bookpage, NPR, Washington Post, and The Economist A moving novel on the power of friendship in our darkest times, from internationally renowned writer and speaker Elif Shafak.<...

Turkey | Turkish author

The sand fish : a novel from Dubai
Gargash, Maha.
Paper Book
A novel of Dubai, The Sand Fish by Maha Gargash offers readers a fascinating glimpse into another corner of the world. Set in the 1950s in what is now the United Arab Emirates, The Sand Fish tells the poignant and powerful story of a rebellious young woman trapped in a repressive...

United Arab Emirates | Emirati author

Family style : memories of an American from Vietnam
Pham, Thien
Paper Book
YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction Finalist Eisner Award Winner for Best Graphic MemoirAn NPR Best Books of 2023 A moving young adult graphic memoir about a Vietnamese immigrant boy's search for belonging in America, perfect for fans of American...

Vietnam | Vietnamese-American author

I am Nujood, age 10 and divorced
Ali, Nujood.
Paper Book
"I'm a simple village girl who has always obeyed the orders of my father and brothers. Since forever, I have learned to say yes to everything. Today I have decided to say no."   Nujood Ali's childhood came to an abrupt end in 2008 when her father arranged for her to be...

Yemen | Yemeni author


Library staff! You can create and contribute to lists. Contact your catalog administrator or log in here.