Yasmin’s Hammer

A young Bangladeshi girl who helps support her family by working in a brickyard finds a way to make her dream of going to school and learning to read a reality.

Click here to read the Worlds of Words review.

This book has been included in WOW’s Kids Taking Action Booklist. For our current list, visit our Boolist page under Resources in the green navigation bar.

Nasreen’s Secret School: A True Story from Afghanistan

Young Nasreen has not spoken a word to anyone since her parents disappeared. In despair, her grandmother risks everything to enroll Nasreen in a secret school for girls. Will a devoted teacher, a new friend, and the worlds she discovers in books be enough to draw Nasreen out of her shell of sadness? Based on a true story from Afghanistan, this inspiring book will touch readers deeply as it affirms both the life-changing power of education and the healing power of love.

Click here to read the Worlds of Words review.

Quien Es De Aqui: Una Historia De America/ Who Belongs Here?: An American Story (Spanish)

Describes the new life of Nary, a Cambodian refugee, in America, as well as his encounters with prejudice. Includes some general history of U.S. immigration.

The Children of China

Before coming to Canada, while he was still an art teacher in Beijing, Song Nan Zhang traveled from Inner Mongolia east, south, and north to find and paint unusual scenes of Chinese family life.Here are the children who grow up in the saddle with their nomadic parents or become as agile as the mountain goats they tend. A boy plays chess on the ground with his shepherd grandfather. A teenager tends her father’s pottery shop. At festivals a child plays hide-and-seek, behind yellow parasols, and stilt dancers wait to compete.

World History Biographies: Mao Zedong: The Rebel Who Led A Revolution (Ng World History Biographies)

Born in Southern China in 1893, this farmer’s son would rule the world’s most populous country. The young Mao Zedong grew up in a world desperate to break with the ancient rules of the Qing dynasty. Mao challenged convention early in life, and was expelled from school. He joined China’s new Communist Party, and led China’s historic revolution. Hailed by many as a truly liberating hero, others demonized him as a brutal monster. This biography outlines the revolutionary life of the first leader of the People’s Republic of China and sets his march to power in the context of world history.

Shanghai Messenger

A free-verse novel about eleven-year-old Xiao Mei’s visit with her extended family in China, where the Chinese-American girl finds many differences but also the similarities that bind a family together.