Our Favorite Books from Asian and Pacific Islander Authors Releases in 2026
Happy Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month from WWC!
To celebrate, we’re shining a spotlight on some of our personal picks for 2026 releases from Asian and Pacific Islander authors.
The Poet Empress by Shen Tao | January 20, 2026 | Chinese | Historical Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Romance
Jess: This debut novel by Shen Tao about a village girl who offers herself as a concubine to a cruel, violent prince to save her village from starvation. The prose is lush and immersive, with a terrific use of the Rashomon effect as Wei unravels the mysteries surrounding her husband while navigating dangerous court intrigue. However, this book covers darker themes, including child sexual abuse, so reader discretion is advised.
View on Author Shen Tao's website
The Obake Code by Makana Yamamoto | February 10, 2026 | Kānaka Maoli & Hapa Haole | Science Fiction, Queer, Lesbian, Cyberpunk
Mimi: A standalone sci-fi heist novel about a bored hacker who is forced by vicious gangsters to take down a crooked politician, only to find herself facing an unexpected enemy from her past. Written by a Pacific Islander author, this novel is part of an extended “lesbian space heist” universe set in a futuristic Hawai’i-like cityscape, with an all-sapphic and trans cast. I quite enjoyed how the story uses common sci-fi tropes like clones and AI systems gaining sentience to depict themes like labor exploitation, mass displacement, gentrification and surveillance.
View on Author Makana Yamamoto's website
If We Cannot Go at the Speed of Light by Kim Choyeop (translated by Anton Hur) | April 28, 2026 | Korean | Short Stories, Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction
Rina: An SF short story collection about the human yearning for connection—across alien cultural lines, across the border between life and death, across unfathomable spacetime. I was very taken with Kim Cho-yeop’s inquisitive approach to storytelling and her imaginative worlds, which gently ask us to consider the kinds of distances technology is unable to close.
Read my full review here:
The Girl With a Thousand Faces by Sunyi Dean | May 5, 2026 | Hong Konger | Fantasy, Horror, Historical Fiction, Gothic, Paranormal
Mimi: A historical gothic novel set in post-WWII Hong Kong, which blends folklore, commentary on war, and local legends to recount a tale of a ghost-talker woman, who confronts a powerful spirit in the Kowloon Walled City. I've not read this yet, but the premise sounds fantastic.
Behind Five Willows by June Hur | May 26, 2026 | Korean | Historical Romance, Historical Fiction, Young Adult
Rina: An homage to Pride and Prejudice set in Joseon Korea, during a time of government book banning. A girl from a lower-ranking family is a secret novel transcriber; a young lord, an author. This gem of a story was a stunning introduction to the work of June Hur, whose characters are as charming as her elegant, nature-imbued prose.
Read my full review here:
The Typing Lady: And Other Fictions by Ruth Ozeki | June 2, 2026 | Japanese | Short Stories, Literary Fiction, Paranormal
Rina: A collection of literary short stories about desire, ambition, and the ways storytelling shapes reality and memory. Across a variety of settings, Ruth Ozeki creates a full range of sympathetic and unsympathetic narrative voices, resulting in stories that are grounded yet a touch strange, gritty yet beautiful, dark yet hopeful. Ozeki knows how to craft discomfort and hope in equal measure.
Read my full review here:
Let us know your most anticipated reads in the comments!
We have updated the language of this post to describe the featured authors more accurately. Thank you for your feedback and we apologize for the terminology mix-up!
We wish to be inclusive of the contributions of Asian and Pacific Islander creators to American media and culture regardless of where they come from, hence the non-American authors on this list. We hope you enjoy our book recs.
I would also like to suggest a book that just came out, The Killing Spell by Shay Kauwe, an author from Hawai‘i! It's an adult fantasy and from what I understand, the magic system and linguistics are pretty tied together. (I JUST got it, so haven't read much yet.)
