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Memoirs by American Immigrants

	Solito by Javier Zamora Javier Zamora’s adventure is a three-thousand-mile journey from his small town in El Salvador, through Guatemala and Mexico, and across the U.S. border. He will leave behind his beloved aunt and grandparents to reunite with a mother who left four years ago and a father he barely remembers. Traveling alone amid a group of strangers and a “coyote” hired to lead them to safety, Javier expects his trip to last two short weeks. He cannot foresee the perilous boat trips, relentless desert treks, pointed guns, arrests and deceptions that await him; nor can he know that those two weeks will expand into two life-altering months alongside fellow migrants who will come to encircle him like an unexpected family. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	American Like Me: Reflections on a Life Between Cultures by America Ferrera Speaking Spanish at home, having Saturday-morning-salsa-dance-parties in the kitchen, and eating tamales alongside apple pie at Christmas never seemed at odds with her American identity. America invites thirty-one of her friends, peers, and heroes to share their stories about life between cultures. We know them as actors, comedians, athletes, politicians, artists, and writers. However, they are also immigrants, children or grandchildren of immigrants, indigenous people, or people who otherwise grew up with deep and personal connections to more than one culture. Each of them struggled to establish a sense of self, find belonging, and feel seen. And they call themselves American enthusiastically, reluctantly, or not at all. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang When seven-year-old Qian arrives in New York City in 1994 full of curiosity, she is overwhelmed by crushing fear and scarcity. In China, Qian’s parents were professors; in America, her family is “illegal” and it will require all the determination and small joys they can muster to survive. In Chinatown, Qian’s parents labor in sweatshops. Instead of laughing at her jokes, they fight constantly, taking out the stress of their new life on one another. Shunned by her classmates and teachers for her limited English, Qian takes refuge in the library and masters the language through books, coming to think of The Berenstain Bears as her first American friends. But then Qian’s headstrong Ma Ma collapses, revealing an illness that she has kept secret for months for fear of the cost and scrutiny of a doctor’s visit. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	Call Me American: The Extraordinary True Story of a Young Somali Immigrant by Abdi Nor Iftin As a child, Abdi learned English by listening to American pop and watching action films starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. When U.S. marines landed in Mogadishu to take on the warlords, Abdi cheered the arrival of these Americans, who seemed as heroic as those of the movies. Desperate to make a living, Abdi used his language skills to post secret dispatches, which found an audience of worldwide listeners. But when Abdi won entrance to the U.S. in the annual visa lottery, his route to America did not come easily. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	How to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair Throughout her childhood, Safiya Sinclair’s father, a volatile reggae musician and a militant adherent to a strict sect of Rastafari, was obsessed with the ever-present threat of the corrupting evils of the Western world outside their home, and worried that womanhood would make Safiya and her sisters morally weak and impure. Safiya’s extraordinary mother gave her the one gift she knew would take Safiya beyond the stretch of beach and mountains in Jamaica their family called home: a world of books, knowledge, and education she conjured almost out of thin air. When she introduced Safiya to poetry, Safiya’s voice awakened. As she watched her mother struggle voicelessly for years under relentless domesticity, Safiya’s rebellion against her father’s rules set her on an inevitable collision course with him. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	What We Carry by Maya Lang Maya Shanbhag Lang grew up idolizing her brilliant mother, an accomplished physician who immigrated to the United States from India and completed her residency all while raising her children and keeping a traditional Indian home. Maya’s mother had always been a source of support, until Maya became a mother herself. Struggling to understand this abrupt change while raising her own young child, Maya searches for answers and soon learns that her mother is living with Alzheimer’s. Unable to remember or keep track of the stories she once told her daughter about her life in India, why she immigrated, and her experience of motherhood, Maya’s mother divulges secrets about her past that force Maya to reexamine their relationship. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant by Curtis Chin Nineteen eighties Detroit was a volatile place to live, but above the fray stood a safe haven: Chung’s Cantonese Cuisine, where anyone, from the city’s first Black mayor to the local drag queens, from a big-time Hollywood star to elderly Jewish couples, could sit down for a warm, home-cooked meal. Here was where, beneath a bright-red awning and surrounded by his multigenerational family, filmmaker and activist Curtis Chin came of age; where he learned to embrace his identity as a gay ABC, or American-born Chinese; where he navigated the divided city’s spiraling misfortunes; and where he realized just how much he had to offer to the world, to his beloved family, and to himself. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H. When fourteen-year-old Lamya H realizes she has a crush on her female teacher, she covers up her attraction by playing up her roles as overachiever and class clown. Born in South Asia, she moved to the Middle East at a young age and has spent years feeling out of place, like her own desires and dreams don’t matter, and it’s easier to hide in plain sight, but one day in Quran class, she reads a passage about Maryam that changes everything. Lamya juxtaposes her coming out with Musa liberating his people from the pharoah; asks if Allah, who is neither male nor female, might instead be nonbinary; and, drawing on the faith and hope Nuh needed to construct his ark, begins to build a life of her own as a queer, devout Muslim immigrant. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen by Jose Antonio Vargas An immigrant who has found himself homeless and struggling, Jose Antonio Vargas says that "this is not a book about the politics of immigration." Dear America is an intimate portrait of Vargas and his life in America. Whether it be lying, avoiding law enforcement, getting and keeping a job, pinning his hopes on the Dreamer movement then having them dashed by the Trump administration, or building (and rebuilding) community with others, Vargas dives into all the hustling it takes to survive in the U.S. as an undocumented immigrant. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.
	The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You by Dina Nayeri Aged eight, Dina Nayeri fled Iran along with her mother and brother and lived in the crumbling shell of an Italian hotel–turned–refugee camp. Eventually she was granted asylum in America. She settled in Oklahoma, then made her way to Princeton University. In this book, Nayeri weaves together her own vivid story with the stories of other refugees and asylum seekers in recent years, bringing us inside their daily lives and taking us through the different stages of their journeys, from escape to asylum to resettlement. In these pages, a couple fall in love over the phone, and women gather to prepare the noodles that remind them of home. A closeted queer man tries to make his case truthfully as he seeks asylum, and a translator attempts to help new arrivals present their stories to officials. Also available on Libby as an ebook and an audiobook.

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