The Forbidden Temptation of Baseball by Dori Jones Yang is a lively, nuanced novel for children ages 10-14 based on the real-life experiences of 120 boys sent to American by the Emperor of China in the 1870s, expected to live with American families, get into college, learn technology, and return home to modernize China. These real 120 Chinese boys formed the Chinese Educational Mission to the United States, organized by education pioneer Yung Wing. This book brings their story to life for children of today.
Every Falling Star, A memoir of Sungju Lee, a North Korean boy who was forced at the age of twelve to live on the streets and fend for himself. Sungju tells what it was like to be separated from his parents; to be alone; to have to create a new family with his gang, his "brothers"; to be hungry every day; and to fear arrest, imprisonment, and even execution. He transferred is taekwondo skills to street fighting. He drank. He smoked. He became a pickpocket and dropped out of school. He lost everything but the hope that he would meet his parents again. With this hope, he wished whenever he saw a falling star.