Everyday Life

Everyday Life introduces children to the vibrant world created by Shanghai’s Jinshan artists. From a watermelon harvest to an autumn festival to a child’s winter game, vivid, friendly peasant art brings everyday life in rural China into our lives. Simple, rhythmic poems, presented in English, Simplified Chinese, and Pinyin, beautifully accent each painting. Everyday Life’s colorful, bustling illustrations will capture a child’s imagination, while descriptive bilingual text invites English and Chinese readers to enjoy the sweetness of each page. ThingsAsian Kids presents a series of books introducing children to the beauty and wonder of Asia. Other ThingsAsian Kids books include My Mom is a Dragon and My Dad is a Boar, a whimsical introduction to Chinese paper cut art and the lunar calendar animals; Hiss! Pop! Boom! Celebrating Chinese New Year; and H is for Hong Kong, an international twist on the classic primer, featuring a lovely, hand-tinted cyanotype photograph.

Yeh-Shen (Paperstar Book)

This version of the Cinderella story, in which a young girl overcomes the wickedness of her stepsister and stepmother to become the bride of a prince, is based on ancient Chinese manuscripts written 1000 years before the earliest European version.

Confucius: The Golden Rule

Born in China in 551 B.C., Confucius rose from poverty to the heights of his country’s ruling class. But then he quit his high post for the life of an itinerant philosopher. “The Analects” collects his teachings on education and government, the definition of nobility, the equality of man and the right way and purpose of living, ideas that eventually spread to the West and influenced the great thinkers of the Enlightenment. And five centuries before Christ, Confucius set forth his own Golden Rule: “Do not impose on others what you do not wish for yourself.”

Al Dudatu Al Shadidatu Al Gou

Arabic translation of The Very Hungry Caterpillar. One sunny Sunday, the caterpillar was hatched out of a tiny egg. He was very hungry. On Monday, he ate through one apple; on Tuesday, he ate through two pears; on Wednesday he ate through three plums – and still he was hungry. Strikingly bold, colorful pictures and a simple text in large clear type tell the story of the hungry little caterpillar’s progress through an amazing variety and quantity of foods. Full at last, he made a cocoon around himself and went to sleep, to wake up a few weeks later wonderfully transformed into a butterfly.

Alia’s Mission

The inspiring story of an Iraqi librarian’s courageous fight to save books from the Basra Central Library before it was destroyed in the war.It is 2003 and Alia Muhammad Baker, the chief librarian of the Central Library in Basra, Iraq, has grown worried given the increased likelihood of war in her country. Determined to preserve the irreplacable records of the culture and history of the land on which she lives from the destruction of the war, Alia undertakes a courageous and extremely dangerous task of spiriting away 30,000 books from the library to a safe place.Told in dramatic graphic-novel panels by acclaimed cartoonist Mark Alan Stamaty, Alia’s Mission celebrates the importance of books and the freedom to read, while examining the impact of war on a country and its people.From the Hardcover edition.

This book has been a featured book in our Middle East and South Asia Arabic Language and Culture Kit.

Muhammad

Introduces Muhammad and the basic tenets of the Islamic faith.

The Hunger Games

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlaying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one girl and one boy between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV. Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she is forced to represent her district in the Games. But Katniss has also resolved to outwit the creators of the games. To do that she will have to be the last person standing at the end of the deadly ordeal, and that will take every ounce of strength and cunning she has.

Switched

When Wendy Everly was six-years-old, her mother was convinced she was a monster and tried to kill her. It isn’t until eleven years later that Wendy finds out her mother might’ve been telling the truth. With the help of Finn Holmes, Wendy finds herself in a world she never knew existed – and it’s one she’s not sure if she wants to be a part of.