The library will be closed Sunday, March 31st, for Easter

Memorial Hall Library

Writing the Dream: Books By American Immigrants

John F. Kennedy wrote, “Everywhere immigrants have enriched and strengthened the fabric of American life.” Since its founding, American culture has always benefited from the artistic contribution of immigrants. Here are some great books written by first and second generation immigrants to the United States.

Americanah
Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Separated by respective ambitions after falling in love in occupied Nigeria, beautiful Ifemelu experiences triumph and defeat in America while exploring new concepts of race, while Obinze endures an undocumented status in London until the pair is reunited in their homeland 15 years later, where they face the toughest decisions of their lives. By the award-winning author of Half of a Yellow Sun.
In the time of the butterflies
In the time of the butterflies
by Julia Alvarez

The life and death of three revolutionary sisters in the Dominican Republic, told by a surviving fourth. One by one the Mirabal Sisters, as they were known, join the opposition to the Trujillo dictatorship in the 1950s, suffering imprisonment and torture while their men watch powerless. They are released, then one night their jeep is ambushed. A story based on real events by the author of How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents.
The last days of Café Leila : a novel
The last days of Café Leila : a novel
by Donia Bijan

A woman, Noor, visits her native Iran for the first time in three decades with her sulky, rebellious teenage daughter, Lily, who becomes caught up in the dangerous balance between grace and brutal violence that have taken hold of Tehran.
We need new names : a novel
We need new names : a novel
by NoViolet Bulawayo

Follows 10-year-old Zimbabwe native, Darling, as she escapes the closed schools and paramilitary police control of her homeland in search of opportunity and freedom with an aunt in America.
Make your home among strangers
Make your home among strangers
by Jennine Capó Crucet

Upsetting her family by attending an elite college far from home, Cuban-American Lizet struggles with identity issues and her father's abandonment before meeting a young boy whose mother's death enmeshes Lizet's family in Florida's heated immigration debates.
The Wangs vs. the world
The Wangs vs. the world
by Jade Chang

A wealthy but fractured Chinese family loses everything in the financial crisis before embarking on a haphazard but ultimately redemptive journey across America as part of an effort to reclaim ancestral lands in China. A first novel.
Claire of the sea light
Claire of the sea light
by Edwidge Danticat

When a vibrant 7-year-old disappears from her Haitian community at the same time her father agonizingly decides to give her up so that she can have a better life, an ensuing search reveals the painful stories of neighbors whose lives the child touched. By the National Book Critics Circle Award-winning author of Breath, Eyes, Memory.
Here comes the sun : a novel
Here comes the sun : a novel
by Nicole Dennis-Benn

Working as a prostitute near the pristine beaches and turquoise seas of Jamaica to pay for a younger sister's education, Margot hopes that a new hotel that is reshaping her home will grant her financial independence and allow her to pursue a forbidden affair with another woman. A first novel.
The brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao
The brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao
by Junot Díaz

Living with an old-world mother and rebellious sister, an urban New Jersey misfit dreams of becoming the next J. R. R. Tolkien and believes that a long-standing family curse is thwarting his efforts to find love and happiness. A first novel by the author of the collection, Drown. 
Here in Berlin : a novel
Here in Berlin : a novel
by Cristina García

A provocative portrait of contemporary Berlin touches on the country's complex, troubled past in World War II as observed by an unnamed narrator who interacts with a Cuban teen POW, a young Jewish scholar being smuggled into England and a lawyer haunted by her traumatic childhood. By the award-winning author of Dreaming in Cuban.
An untamed state
An untamed state
by Roxane Gay

Her perfect life is shattered when Mireille is kidnapped by armed men in front of her father's estate in Haiti and she must endure the horrors and torments of her captors while her father inexplicably resists paying for her ransom.
Homegoing
Homegoing
by Yaa Gyasi

Two half sisters, unknown to each other, are born into different villages in 18th-century Ghana and experience profoundly different lives and legacies throughout subsequent generations marked by wealth, slavery, war, coal mining, the Great Migration and the realities of 20th-century Harlem. 
The kite runner
The kite runner
by Khaled Hosseini

Traces the unlikely friendship of Amir, a wealthy Afghanistani youth, and a servant's son, in a tale that spans the final days of the nation's monarchy through the atrocities of the present day.
House of lords and commons
House of lords and commons
by Ishion Hutchinson

A stunning collection that traverses the borders of culture and time from the 2011 winner of the PEN / Joyce Osterweil Award.
Girl in translation
Girl in translation
by Jean Kwok

Emigrating with her mother from Hong Kong to Brooklyn, Kimberly Chang begins a secret double life as an exceptional schoolgirl during the day and sweatshop worker at night, an existence also marked by a first crush and the pressure to save her family from poverty. A first novel.
The lowland : a novel
The lowland : a novel
by Jhumpa Lahiri

Frequently mistaken for one another in spite of very different natures, brothers Subhash and Udayan Mitra pursue respective lives in rebellion-torn 1960s Calcutta until a shattering tragedy compels Subhash to return to India, where he endeavors to heal family wounds. By the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Unaccustomed Earth.
Behold the dreamers : a novel
Behold the dreamers : a novel
by Imbolo Mbue

Two marriages, one immigrant working class and the other from the top one percent, are shaped by financial circumstances, infidelities, secrets and the 2008 recession. A first novel.
Under the udala trees
Under the udala trees
by Chinelo Okparanta

A young Nigerian girl, displaced during a civil war, begins a powerful love affair with another refugee girl from a different ethnic community until the pair are discovered and must learn the cost of living a lie amidst taboos and prejudices. 
Chemistry : a novel
Chemistry : a novel
by Weike Wang

Losing her love for her major when her graduate studies become subject to research failures and high pressure, a Boston University student contemplates a marriage proposal from a more successful fellow scientist while she pursues an entirely different kind of chemistry.
American street
American street
by Ibi Zoboi

Separated from her detained mother after moving from Haiti to America, Fabiola struggles to navigate the home of her loud cousins and a new school on Detroit's gritty west side, where a surprising romance and a dangerous proposition challenge her ideas about freedom. A first novel.