Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month

Ranging from South Asia to the Pacific Islands, the literary achievements of Asian Americans and Asian immigrants, as with the very experiences they chronicle, are varied, rich, and indispensable to the American literary canon. You’re invited to browse some of our favorites below.

LOCAL SPOTLIGHT: Jaw: Poems, by Albert Abonado

Albert Abonado is a poet and essayist based in Rochester, NY. He holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. He has received fellowships for poetry from the New York Foundation for the Arts, and he was a finalist for the Kundiman prize. Albert currently teaches creative writing at SUNY Geneseo and the Rochester Institute for Technology.

LOCAL SPOTLIGHT: This is One Way to Dance: Essays, by Sejal Shah

Sejal Shah's stories and essays have appeared  in The Guardian, Brevity, Conjunctions, Guernica, the Kenyon Review Online, Literary Hub, Longreads, and The Rumpus. The recipient of a 2018 NYFA fellowship in fiction, Sejal recently completed a story collection and is at work on a memoir about mental health. She lives in Rochester, New York.