10 Influential Asian American and Pacific Islander Authors

Ocean Vuong

Get to know novelist and poet Ocean Vuong. His novel "On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous" spent six weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Written in the form of a letter from a Vietnamese American son to his illiterate mother, the novel is semi-autobiographical. In 2019, Vuong described his creative process to Michel Martin in an interview for Amanpour & Co. He explained: "As a writer, as a thinker, I am most useful to myself and to this world when I ask: Now what? What can I do now?... I try to write my books out of that question."

In another fantastic interview, also in 2019, with NPT's A Word on Words, Vuong discusses the novel's epistolary format as a sort of crisis of communication many of us have in which we ask: will we be heard?

Vuong has also published award-winning poetry collections, including "Night Sky With Exit Wounds" and most recently, "Time is a Mother." In the latter collection, Vuong writes beautifully through his grief after his mother's death. In this 2022 clip from PBS NewsHour, he talks about "reclaiming language for joy" in his poetry.

Amy Tan

Amy Tan's 1989 debut novel "The Joy Luck Club" was a smash hit and it was a story that was uniquely Chinese American while speaking about universal themes of identity and familial bonds. The novel centered on four Chinese immigrant families, and it was actually structured similarly to a mahjong game with 16 chapters across four parts. The book struck a chord with millions of readers and it was later turned into a Hollywood movie.

Tan's writing career was in full swing, but it actually shifted from non-fiction genres like astrological advice to fiction after she realized how much she learned about herself in the meaningful work of writing other characters. 

In a clip from American Masters' Amy Tan: Unintended Memoir we hear from Kevin Kwan, the author of "Crazy Rich Asians." Kwan talks about the impact Amy Tan's celebrated debut novel had on other Asian American writers who came after her. (By the way, if you haven't read "Crazy Rich Asians," please, please do so soon because it's so much fun and you'll love it.)

Viet Thanh Nguyen

Viet Thanh Nguyen came to the United States as a Vietnamese refugee at the age of four. In 2015 he published his debut novel, "The Sympathizer." The spy thriller is also part comedy, part historical fiction, and a whole exploration of identity. You have to read it. The Pulitzer Prize committee agreed and awarded "The Sympathizer" the prize for fiction in 2016.

In his subsequent fiction and non-fiction work, Nguyen continues to explore themes of identity, the resilience of refugees, how storytelling shapes cultural narratives. He spoke about his work last year as part the series Be/longing: Asian Americans Now that is worth a listen. And you can also watch his PBS Books interviews about The Refugees, The Displaced, and The Sympathizer. And we also recommend you get to know him from his Brief But Spectacular take on writing and memory.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Jhumpa Lahiri's very first book, "The Interpreter of Maladies," was a collection of short stories. It won the Pulizer Prize for fiction in 2000. Three years later, she published her first novel, "The Namesake," and cemented her place in book lovers' hearts. The novel is about an immigrant family who moves to Cambridge, Massachusetts from Kolkata, the Bengali city in India formerly known as Calcutta. Lahiri's novel instantly connects with so many Americans who have lived in two worlds, as first generation immigrant families often feel.

Lahiri's voice is so unique and moving, but when it comes to language(s) she described feeling that growing up as a child of Indian immigrants, both Bengali and English were foreign languages. She later studied and learned Italian and wrote another book, this time in Italian. It is titled "In Oltre Parole," and that translates to "In Other Words."

Lahiri describes her writing and her love of Italian in a clip from NJ PBS' show State of the Arts.

Li-Young Lee

Reading "Rose" by Li-Young Lee feels like a foundational lesson in poetry. You read it once and you never forget it. Then you revisit Lee's debut collection of poems and feel double the emotion in the pauses. It's hard to hide one's appreciation of Lee's work. He published "Rose" in 1986 and has since published a memoir and several more award-winning collections of poetry, including the latest one in 2018 titled "The Undressing."

Lee was born in 1957 in Jakarta, Indonesia and his parents were Chinese political exiles. They arrived in the United States in 1964, and they eventually settled in Pennsylvania. While attending the University of Pittsburgh, Lee dedicated himself to poetry and studied under Gerald Stein. In this vintage video below from The Poetry Foundation, you can hear Li-Young Lee read his poem "From Blossoms." Enjoy.

Helen Zia

Helen Zia is an author whose work you should read. She is an award-winning journalist and Asian American and LGBTQ rights activist. Her first book, "Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People" chronicles Asian American history while connecting it to her own experiences. The book is educational while also feeling like a memoir.

Zia's parents are Chinese immigrants and she has spoken out against injustice and inequality throughout her life. You might have seen Zia in several PBS documentaries, including Who Killed Vincent Chin? and Asian Americans. Last year, the 40th anniversary of Vincent Chin's death, Zia spoke with Amanpour & Co.'s Hari Sreenivasan about the parallels between then and the current rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans.

David Henry Hwang

David Henry Hwang is a playwright, professor, and television producer. He is also considered the most-produced living opera librettist (he has written 13.) His seminal play "M. Butterfly" took a turn-of-the-century Italian opera and and intertwined it with a true story about the lies we tell ourselves in love. The main characters of Hwang's 1988 connect at a performance Puccini's Madama Butterfly, and their story dives deep into concepts of gender identity, as well as an exploration of Asian and Western gender stereotypes. The play went on to earn multiple Tony Awards in 1988, including Best Play for Hwang and Best Performance by a Featured Actor for B.D. Wong in the role of Song Lilling.

M. Butterfly was the first Asian American play staged on Broadway. Thirty years later, Hwang updated the original play for a 2017 revival. Some of what had felt shocking in the original performance was no longer so, but much of the play remains extremely relevant. Before you start reading M. Butterfly with your book club, get to know Hwang in this interview with the American Theatre Wing.

Maxine Hong Kingston

Maxine Hong Kingston wrote the influential 1976 book "The Woman Warrior." It blends her personal stories with Chinese folklore, and in its entirety the genre-crossing book explores themes of immigration, gender, and cultural identity.

Kingston's parents were Chinese immigrants who settled in California, where she was born. She later taught high school there before moving to Hawaii, where she began writing. She completed "The Woman Warrior" while in Oahu, and eventually became a professor at University of California, Berkeley. She has continued to publish her work across genres: poetry, essays, and novels that often reflect her cultural heritage and identity.

You can watch a great discussion of "The Woman Warrior" from 2019 with PBS Newhour's Jeffrey Brown, Maxine Hong Kingston, and "Little Fires Everywhere" author Celeste Ng. (p.s. "Little Fires Everywhere" is yet another book you should check out if you haven't already read it!)

Ken Liu

Science fiction and fantasy readers probably already know why Ken Liu is on this list. "The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories" is a collection of short stories Liu published in 2011. It leaves readers in a space between reality and magic, it's just so good. The Paper Menagerie was the first work of fiction to all three major science fiction awards: the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards.

Based in Boston, Massachusetts, Liu has written other short fiction and an epic fantasy series: The Dandelion Dynasty. As much as we can describe his writing, you have to experience it yourself. The next best thing we can offer is Levar Burton reading The Paper Menagerie to you. So here it is.

Sia Figiel

Poet and novelist Sia Figiel uses traditional Samoan storytelling in much of her award-winning work. Her first novel "where we once belonged" was published in 1996, and it was the first novel by a Samoan woman to be published in the United States. It is a coming-of-age story that touches on aspects of identity, gender, and tradition via the main character, thirteen year old Alofa Filiga.

Figiel is also well-known for her performance poetry and published a collection of prose titled "To a Young Artist in Contemplation" in 1998. Figiel currently lives in Samoa, and continues to write poetry. Interesting note: documentary filmmaker Kimberlee Bassford (who recently produced and directed My Chinatown, With Aloha) is currently working on a film about Sia Figiel.