Asian Fiction

China
Inheritance  by Lan Samantha Chang
Making a pact to stay together after their mother's suicide, Junan and her sister, Yinan, find their vow challenged when Junan is separated from her husband by the Japanese invasion of China and sends Yinan after him.

Soul Mountain  by Xingjian Gao
Threatened with time on a prison farm for defying his country's laws of cultural conformity, artist/writer Gao Xingjian embarked on an epic search for his inner self and for his freedom. The author's journey through southern China's ancient mountains and forests inspired this story.

Waiting  by Ha Jin
An ambitious and dedicated Chinese doctor, Lin Kong finds himself torn between two very different women – the educated and dynamic nurse with whom he has fallen in love and the traditional, meek and humble woman to whom his family married him when they were both very young.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan  by Lisa See
A story of friendship set in 19th-century China follows an elderly woman and her companion as they communicate their hopes, dreams, joys and tragedies through a unique secret language.

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress  by Dai Sijie
During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, two boys are sent to the country for reeducation, where their lives take an unexpected turn when they meet the beautiful daughter of a local tailor and stumble upon a forbidden stash of Western literature.

Japan
Across the Nightingale Floor  by Lian Hearn
In a novel set in a land much like ancient Japan, a young boy named Takeo becomes a pawn in the ceaseless wars between rival warlord clans in a culture ruled by codes of honor and formal rituals.

Kafka on the Shore  by Haruki Murakami
An unlikely alliance forms between Kafka Tamura, a 15-year-old runaway, and the aging Nakata, a man who has never recovered from a wartime affliction, as they embark on a surreal odyssey through a strange, fantastical world.

In the Miso Soup  by Ryu Murakami
When tour guide Kenji is hired by Frank, an American with bizarre habits, to show him the seamier side of Tokyo's nightlife, the man's strange behavior leads Kenji to suspect that he is the serial killer that has been terrorizing the area.

Kitchen  by Banana Yoshimoto
A lyrical tale about loss and grief and familial love. When college student Mikage Sakurai is orphaned by the death of her grandmother, she is rescued from loneliness and grief by Yuichi, a young flower shop delivery man and discovers that families come in many shapes ... and can be found in many places.

The Silent Cry  by Kenzaburo Oe
Two brothers, Mitsu, a scholar, and Takashi, a political activist, return to their village in the 1960s and Taksashi protests a wealthy Korean's taking over of the town.

Vietnam
Le Colonial  by Kien Nguyen
Voyaging to 1774 Annam, the exotic South China region that came to be known as Vietnam, three missionaries find their dreams of colonial glory dissolving in their discoveries of the area's sophisticated culture, violent instability and predisposition to natural disaster.

Thailand
Bangkok 8  by John Burdett
Bangkok policeman Sonchai Jitplecheep investigates the murder of an African-American Marine sergeant and the subsequent death of his partner, making his way through a world of illicit drugs and corruption to find a vicious killer.

Hong Kong – Hollywood Style
Fan Tan  by Marlon Brando
While serving time in a Hong King prison in 1927, Anatole Doultry saves the life of a Chinese prisoner whose employer is Madame Lai Choi San, a beautiful and powerful Asian gangster who will make him wealthy if he will join her in an act of piracy.

Malaysia
The Rice Mother  by Rani Manicka
Her idyllic early childhood in Ceylon lost forever when she is traded in marriage to a stranger in Malaysia, Lakshmi struggles to raise a family and survive the Second World War despite her husband's immaturity.