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May is Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month! To celebrate, I’ve curated a list of fantastic books by AANHPI authors that also check off tasks on the 2025 Read Harder Challenge. We have a queer sci-fi heist story, a mystery, a graphic memoir, a much-anticipated fantasy novel, romance, weird horror, and poetry to choose from.
But of course, that doesn’t even scratch the surface of all the AANHPI books worth reading this month and every month. Scroll to the end of this list to find links to even more recommendations.
Task #1: Read a 2025 release by a BIPOC author.
Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto
Be gay, do crime: This queer, debut sci-fi novel is a heist story! Once upon a time in future Hawai’i, Edie trusted Angel, and now Edie has spent eight years in prison. Womp womp. Then Edie gets word that early parole is available—they just have to do one last job. For Angel. Edie thinks it would be outrageous to trust Angel again. But they’d also really like to get out of prison, so Edie agrees. What could go wrong? —Liberty Hardy
Task #3: Read a queer mystery.
The Verifiers (Claudia Lin Book 1) by Jane Pek
All Claudia Lin’s traditional Chinese family wants for her is to find a nice, safe career and a nice, safe Chinese boy. But Claudia likes girls and isn’t down with all that model minority stuff. In fact, she’s just been recruited by a secretive, referrals-only online dating detective agency. As a lifelong mystery reader who wrote her senior thesis on Jane Austen, she’s pretty jazzed about this. But when a client goes missing, Claudia’s digging uncovers goings on at the company she was never meant to know about… —Vanessa Diaz
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For even more great AANHPI reads, check out these lists: