Written by Kelsey Hedrick

It’s always my goal as a librarian to have books and stories that reflect the experiences, people, and history of those who are in the school.  Having lived in Southeast Asia (Cambodia, Thailand, and now Indonesia) for the majority of my career, I’m finally starting to see books that are set in this region and written by people who have this as their lived experience.  It’s starting to become a bit of an obsession – I feel like I’m digging through SLJ reviews and Goodreads lists to see any hint of this region represented in print. 

Of course, over the past decade, there’s been an explosion of media from South Korea and Japan.  Singapore has a remarkable literature scene.  Korean-American and Japanese-American stories are now widely available.   In fact, the immigrant experience has been widely represented in print in the last few years.  There are a few great options about the Vietnam War and the migration that it forced, about children not fitting into their new countries.  Some countries have excellent literature in their native languages, but untranslated.  

But books set here?  In Thailand, in Indonesia, in Malaysia, in Cambodia?  Written by people who lived those experiences?  You’ve likely heard of our big stars: Hanna Alkaf, Jesse Q. Sutanto, maybe even Innosanto Nagara – the authors that have gotten big and shown this part of Asia to the world.

For Hanna Alkaf, my personal favorite is the Weight of Our Sky, because I love historical fiction set in this region (though I heard from her that it isn’t her personal favorite).  For Jesse Q. Sutanto, my kids are obsessed with The Obsession.  I also want to give a shout-out to Christina Soontornvat for writing some excellent books set in Thailand and another shout-out to Zen Cho for writing one of my favorite horrors set in Malaysia.  I loved it.  Batavia (aka Jakarta) has just gotten some love from a bunch of review agencies – Lucille Abendanon put together a beautiful tale that took her grandmother’s story and put it into print. 

But I wanted more, so I started digging into some of the work that Hanna Alkaf has been doing to create story collections and gather authors together.  She has a book that is coming out towards the end of October 2025 about the mythical creatures all around this area:  The Beasts Beneath the Winds.

Looking through the list of authors got me wondering about the authors that she’s been able to collect for this anthology.  She’s unapologetically Malaysian, writing Malaysian stories about Malaysian kids, and she values the authenticity of the craft.  Let’s look at her chosen list of authors and some of their books!

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Author: Nadia Mikail
Based in London, UK, but originally from Sarawak, Malaysia

Book: The Cats We Meet Along the Way (2022)
Set in Malaysia

Interview with Nadia Mikail by The Bookseller, July 2023

You can find a copy of The Cats We Meet Along the Way in a library here.

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Author: Brandon Hoàng
Based in Portland, Oregon, USA

Book: The Crossbow of Destiny (2024)
Set in Vietnam

Freeman Award 2024 – Honorable Mention

You can buy a copy of The Crossbow of Destiny here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Mandy Moe Pwint Tu
Born in Yangon, Myanmar

Book: Monsoon Daughter: Poems (2022)

See the Poetry Foundation page for Mandy Moe Pwint Tu

You can find a copy of Monsoon Daughter: Poems in a library here.

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Comic artists, writers & colorists: Jessica (Jes) and Jacinta (Cin) Wibowo
Chinese-Indonesian twins, born in Jakarta, Indonesia

Book: Lunar Boy: a graphic novel (2024)
Set: on an Indonesian-inspired New Earth

Winner of the ALA Stonewall Award 2025.

You can buy a copy of Lunar Boy here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: V. T. Bidania
Born in Laos and grew up in Minnesota in the US

Book: Astrid & Apollo and the Starry Campout (2020).
One of a series, featuring Hmong-American characters, set in the US.

Her debut middle grade verse novel, A Year Without a Home, is a fictionalized memoir about her family’s escape from Laos at the end of the Vietnam War, coming out in 2026.

You can buy a copy of Astrid & Apollo and the Starry Campout here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author/Illustrator: Dow Phumiruk
Originally from Thailand, now living in the US

Illustrator of Titan and the Wild Boars: The True Cave Rescue of the Thai Soccer Team (2019), to name just one.

Also the author of several picture books for younger children.

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Author: June CL Tan
Originally from Singapore, now living in the US

Book: Darker by Four (2024)
Inspired by Haw Par Villa, a Chinese cultural park in Singapore, as she explains in this author note. The second book in this duology — Brighter than Nine — will be published in 2026.

You can buy a copy of Darker by Four here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author and graphic artist: Gail D. Villanueva
Born and based in the Philippines

Book: Lulu Sinagtala and the City of Noble Warriors (2024)
A second book in the Lulu Sinagtala and the Tagalog Gods series — Lulu Sinagtala and the Battle for the Realms — will be published in October 2025.

You can buy a copy of Lulu Sinagtala and the City of Nobel Warriors here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Van Hoang
Born in Vietnam, now living in California

Book: Girl Giant and the Monkey King (2020)
Sequel: Girl Giant and the Jade War (2021)

The Monkey King mythology has a long history; young adults might also try the original — The Monkey King: Journey to the West — by Wu Cheng’en, newly translated by Julia Lovell and published by Penguin Classics (2025). (Great recent podcast about it here.)

You can buy a copy of Girl Giant and the Monkey King here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Veeda Bybee
Born in the US to Asian immigrants

Book: The Invincible List of Lani Li (2025)
Publisher blurb: “A challenge from her little brother and a Chinese fable inspire Lani Li to hit every note of invincible bravery on her band trip to London.”

In October 2025 you can buy a copy of The Invincible List of Lani Li here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Greg van Eekhout
Born in the US to Dutch-Indonesian parents

Writes middle-grade fantasy and sci-fi books, as well as fiction for adults.

You can buy a copy of his most recent middle-grade novel Happy Town (2024) here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Installation artist, cartoonist, and experience designer: Shing Yin Khor
Originally from Malacca, Malaysia, now based in California

Book: The Legend of Auntie Po (2021)
Finalist, National Book Awards 2021 for Young People’s Literature

You can buy a copy of The Legend of Auntie Po here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Mae Respico
Filipino-American from California

Book: Isabel in Bloom (2024)
Verse novel featuring a Filipino-American girl

You can buy a copy of Isabel in Bloom here or find it in a library here. (Book purchases made via our affiliate link may earn GLLI a small commission.)

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Author: Moniza Hossain
Singaporean author and illustrator of Bengali descent

Book: The Fear Factory — her middle-grade debut will be published in the fall of 2026.
Publisher blurb: “THE FEAR FACTORY, in which a lonely boy travels to his family home in Singapore in order to connect with his deceased mother. But when he meets her ghost, she is frozen in time at age twelve. He’ll have to untangle the decades-old mystery keeping her trapped—even if it means losing her forever.”

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Of course, I’m partial at this moment to books set in Indonesia, or books by authors who I could easily invite to an author visit.  But I’d also like to implore publishers to give me some stories set outside North America and Europe.  

I met Hanna last year at the Librarians Knowledge Sharing Workshop in Penang, Malaysia, and Jesse Sutanto the year prior.  And some things that they said always stuck a bit with me.  Of course I’m eager to read some historical stories about the place I live in, and to encourage students to know a bit more about the place where we live.  But those stories aren’t always the most interesting to them.

They wanted to have stories about people being people in the place where they live.  

I also want stories of people being people in their homes.  

I want normal kids living in Jakarta, or Phnom Penh, or Bangkok – going through their lives and enjoying them with touches of culture subtly yet ever present.  I want dystopian and horror stories that use something besides the forests of the States to set their scene.  I want Fantasy that lets me escape into a world where the mythology and traditions reflect the people behind them.  My library needs more historical fiction set in Asia.  But publishing also needs more stories that are centered somewhere where normal people live, especially for Middle Grades kids and young adults.

Let me end with a quote from Innosanto Nagara, Indonesian author, artist, and activist designer — who was being interviewed about the rise of book challenges in the US, where he is based.  

“That only covers books that get past the gatekeepers of the publishing world in the first place. There’s a whole other piece to this in relation to how diverse voices have and continue to not even make it through the front door. There have been some efforts to address this in recent years, mainly spurred by activists and librarians. But we have a long way to go.”

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Kelsey (K) Hedrick is a Middle School Librarian currently working at the Jakarta Intercultural School in Indonesia.  She’s worked in all kinds of schools but loves the chaos and kindness of the Middle Grades.  Before Indonesia, she was in Moscow, Russia, Bangkok, Thailand, Siem Reap, Cambodia, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. 

In 2024, she hosted the Librarian’s Knowledge Sharing Workshop at JIS with her amazing staff.  Her main goal in life is to get the right book in the right reader’s hands.

Outside of librarianship, she runs trails on the mountains and spends time looking at and making art.

Katie Day is an international school teacher-librarian in Singapore and has been an American expatriate for almost 40 years (most of those in Asia). She is currently the chair of the 2025 GLLI Translated YA Book Prize and co-chair of the Neev Book Award in India, as well as heavily involved with the Singapore Red Dot Book Awards. Katie was the guest curator on the GLLI blog for the UN #SDGLitMonth in March 2021 and guest co-curator for #IndiaKidLitMonth in September 2022.