In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, we asked Jhoanna Belfer, owner of Bel Canto Books in Long Beach, CA to help our listeners find their next AAPI-authored audiobook. Read on for more from Jhoanna, and take the quiz to find your next favorite audiobook!
As a Filipina-American book-lover and bookstore owner, I’m astonished and excited by the tremendous breadth of work we’re seeing from AAPI authors, from contemporary novels like Your House Will Pay and The Leavers, to ground-breaking memoirs like Good Talk and Minor Feelings, and rediscovered classics like America Is In The Heart and Native Speaker. As a young reader, I didn’t even understand that there was a lack of representation in the literature we read in school; Anglo-European authors were simply the unexamined default, the norm. Through these AAPI books, and so many others, I’ve gained a profound appreciation for the rich multiplicity of voices and experiences that inform and reflect the great American narrative.
Through these AAPI books, and so many others, I’ve gained a profound appreciation for the rich multiplicity of voices and experiences that inform and reflect the great American narrative.
Jhoanna Belfer, owner of Bel Canto Books
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