Yes, I’m Asian and yes, I love Asian books with my whole heart.
When this reading challenge was announced, I knew that I wanted to do it but I was hesitant, because if you’ve been following me for some time, you’ll know that I want 2019 to be stress-free reading-wise.

But, peer pressure, exciting reading challenges and cool badges EXIST and so reluctantly, I thought “you know what I’M GONNA DO THIS!”
To give some context of what “THIS” is, a Year of the Asian Reading Challenge is being hosted by, Lily, Vicky, Shealea, and CW which lasts the whole of 2019 and is a challenge to read Asian books (books written by Asian authors specifically). Check out any of the posts linked above to find out about badges, giveaways, links, chats and more! If you want to join, use the sign-up form linked in the aforementioned posts!

MY TBR
The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X R PAN: This is going to be a re-read and I’M SO EXCITED to re-read my favourite book of 2018 again and just be a mess once again!!
And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini: I LOVE THE KITE RUNNER SO MUCH and I read the short story at the beginning of this and cried!!! So the actual book is going to kill me!!
Wildcard by Marie Lu: I don’t know IF I’m going to get to this because I’ve heard it’s bad and boring but I also I LOVED WARCROSS?! And I’m desperate to see what happens next?
Forest of A Thousand Lanterns by Julie Dao: I’ve been meaning to read this but the ugly cover has put me off! I really want to read it because so many people say the main character is fierce and awesome!
Empress of All Seasons by Emiko Jean: I’ve had this on currently reading from last year and it’s not bad!! I just keep getting distracted by other books. I’m going to restart it because I’ve forgotten so much of it.
Mariama Sharma Hits The Road by Sheba Karim: I’m so excited to read this! I read like one page last year and already loved it plus the cover is beautiful! ALSO PAKISTANI CHARACTERS YES. (so rare!)
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini: THIS WILL MAKE ME CRY.
Flame In The Mist by Renee Adieh: I don’t know what I will think of this but I got this two years ago (oops) and I STILL HAVEN’T READ IT.
Summer Bird Blue by Akemi Dawn Bowman: I’m going to be on a blog tour for this, and after loving Starfish, I hope this will be just as good!

YEAH, I WILL FIND ANY REASON TO RE-READ THE SHATTER ME SERIES. I’m warnette trash and with all the snippets and cover reveals of this series coming out I can’t WAIT to re-read this!

Also MAYBE I will read Internment by Samira Ahmad (hesitant because…did I like Love, Hate and Other Filters? No.) I want to read loads of other Asian books coming out this year but I’m a broke bookworm and can’t afford any of the new, shiny releases. But here are the other books I WOULD read if I could!! (this tweet)
https://twitter.com/WhisperOfInk/status/1088849021136003072?s=19

TARGET

(THIS BADGE IS SO CUTE!!) As a note, I don’t plan to read ALL the books on my TBR; this is just so I have a few books to pick from! Because I’m trying to be less stressful when it comes to reading, I will be only aiming for the first badge which is Philippine tarsier: 1 to 10 books read.

updates
UPDATES
This will serve as my 2019 update post where I will add the books that I have actually read for the challenge!
f e b r u a r y

AN EMBER IN THE ASHES
BY SABAA TAHIR
★★★★★
This book definitely lived up to the hype (surprisingly). I found myself deeply immersed in the story and the characters. I cannot wait to read the next instalment!

What are some of your favourite Asian books/authors? What reading challenges are you doing in 2019? Do you want to buddy read any of these with me? Are you doing #YARC2019? Let me know in the comments!

I loved Flame in the Mist, and I really enjoyed Empress of All Seasons. There are some content warnings for Empress of All Seasons.
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Oh yay, That gives me hope for both books! I think i’ve seen the CW for Empress but thank you.
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You’re very welcome.
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This is such a cool challenge. Even though,
I’m not Asian I def want to read more from Asian authors and also just from more diverse authors in general. Ahh really need to read The Astonishing Color of After and Forest of A Thousand Lanterns (The Evil Queen and Snow White origin story? Yes please!)Also, I really loved Wildcard, I was expecting it to be bad since the reviews were mainly bad but I had a blast with it. Low-key really want to reread Ignite Me rn 😂
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Yeah! i think it’s really important to read asian books by asian authors! Oh you do need Astonishing right now! And oh that gives me hope for Wildcard and I always want to read warnette content, it’s a constant mood
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I know, i’m a terrible reader. Yeah, I loved Wilcard, not as good ad Warcross but the characters and plot are still awesome and it really reminded me why I loved Warcross so much. I’m more here Warner than Juliette tbh
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I agree more diversity good … I think I end up reading predominately from white female authors.
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The Astonishing Color of After is inCREDible. It totally wrecked me too (and I was in public so that was a fun time sobbing my eyes out haha)! I am so excited to see that there is a popular book with Pakistani characters – feels good to finally be seen 🙂
I would only add one more to your list to share with you when you’re ready for another to add: The Empress of Bright Moon duology. Absolutely beautiful prose and twists and turns you’ll never see coming!
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It’s SO GOOD I cannot believe! The writing is groegous and the story as equally heartbreaking and I am so ready to be a mess all over again! and I need more YA books with pakistani rep? we’re so under-represented in YA!
and ohh i’ll search it up, it sounds amazing! thanks for the recommendation! ❤
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Haha, yes! It is hard to find us out there. I guess that means we have to write those ourselves 🙂 Yes, definitely do!!
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This looks like an amazing TBR! I LOVE all of Khaled Hosseini’s books ❤ There are so many amazing sounding Asian fantasies coming out too, and I want to read them ALL! Good luck with your reading, and I hope you love everything you pick up!
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ILSA ILSA ILSA ILSA ILSA ILSA PLS HELP I AM SCREAMING YOU HAVE SUCH A CUTE DESIGN!! I LOVE THE ICE CREAM DIVIDERS AND THE RAINBOW SIGN OFF AND EVERYTHING IS SO AWESOME!! >insert plenty of heart eyes>
Also it’s great of you to take part! I’m hopefully going to take part in it but I don’t know? I’ve just realised how hard it is to find Asian books so…
I may be reading the astonishing feather of after again (since its in the library and you love it so much) but OMG I NEVER REALISED THE SHATTER ME SERIES HAD ASIAN???? IT HAS MOVED ABOUT A THOUSAND UP MY TBR.
You’ll completely smash your goal and I’m so happy you’re doing it! YOU DESERVE ALL THE ICE-CREAM.
okay now i have a ton of spanish to do so bye!
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the header will be up on thursday/friday but i’m glad you like what you’ve seen so far!!
i think asian books are hard to find, but this year there SO MANY ASIAN FANTASIES coming out!!! and i’m to broke for any of them!!
and ohhh the shatter me series doesn’t have any really out there asian rep (I mean Kenji?) but the author is asian so i counted it as part of the challenge! BUT U SHOULD READ IT ANYWAYS.
and you deserve all the cake and ice cream too ❤
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Ahhh this is such a cool reading challenge! I used to participate in challenges, but I quit some years ago as they just don’t work for me haha. It’s too much pressure and I don’t want to pressure myself when it comes to reading. Already have to do that sometimes when it gets to ARCs haha. That’s really enough reading pressure I need sdngjsk
Good luck, I hope you’ll enjoy all the books you end up reading ❤️
ALSO CAN WE TALK ABOUT YOUR CUTE DIVIDERS AND YOUR CUTE ‘LET’S WHISPER’ AND SIGNATURE I’M IN LOVE
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I KNOW!! This is kind of my first time participating in anything like this so we’ll see how it goes! I like that’s year long so there’s not too much pressure but I understand wanting to make reading less stressful!
AND YES THE FULL DESIGN REVEAL WILL HAPPEN ON JAN 31ST SO BUT THANK YOU THIS HAS BEEN LONG IN THE MAKING
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I HOPE YOU GET TO READ ALL THESE BOOKS AND THEY ARE ALL AMAZING AND THEY MAKE YOUR ASIAN HEART HAPPY
i was so excited to hear about this asian challenge (also hesitant bc all the bad arab/muslim rep i’ve been reading has made me exhausted) but i’m READY to give it a try.
i wanna read more from khaled hosseini and i think this is the perfect time and…….can’t wait for your review on mariam sharma hits the road bc…….i’ve heard some //bad// reviews and i need to know the truth
good luckkkkk
also, your ice cream dividers???? incredible, we stan a blogging queen
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UHM THANK YOU I THINK WE ALL DESERVE THE GOOD ASIAN BOOKS.
(and omg same i’m so TIRED reading all this not relatable muslim rep in books) I’m actually really excited for Mariam Sharma?? I REALLY HOPE I LOVE IT!!
and that’s not even the full design yet JUST U WAIT.
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I’ve seen so many people sign up for this reading challenge recently which keeps pushing me towards joining it too – I mean, who doesn’t want to diversify their reading and experience new and awesome stories??? I’ve read some amazing books by Asian authors and can’t wait to read even more in the future! Best of luck with your reading challenge! I’m sure you’ll be able to collect this super cute badge by the end of 2019 – maybe even one of the other ones that are ridiculously cute too!
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Aha yes I wasn’t going to sign up at first but I saw SO many sign up posts so I just thought I ight as well. Thank you so much for the comment ❤
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I’m so excited for this challenge ❤ hope you love your books 🙂
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Me too! And thanks so much ❤
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ilsa! Thank you so much for joining us for YARC2019 this year. I’m super excited that you’ll be joining and that you’ll be reading more books by Asian authors.
I’ve read THE ASTONISHING COLOUR OF AFTER, and thought it was wonderful! I hope you enjoy it when you get to read this – regardless, I’d LOVE to hear your thoughts on it. 💛
(And I’m so glad you thought the tarsier was cute! That one took me a long time to draw because I found it so difficult to make it cute, but am glad you think so, haha!)
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Ah I’m so excited – this is my first real readathon so I’m super pumped!! Thank you for hosting it ❤
Oh Astonishing is going to be re-read since I loved it so much last year but I'm glad you loved it too!
and all your drawings are so cute – i am in awe of all your talent aha!
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I’m so glad to hear you’re participating in this challenge as well, yay! ❤ I hope you'll love the astonishing color even more the second time around, I really loved this book so, so much. ❤ and I am sooooooooo nervous about reading Wildcard as well because of all the mixed reviews, but I enjoyed the first book a whole lot, too, so I'm just… nervouus haha 🙂
Happy reading! ❤ ❤
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Ilsa… I love you… and this post… but how did you spell Asian wrong two times in your tweet
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idk man i seriously feel like sometimes i have some v mild dyslexia sometimes? (like i can’t even tell my left from right??) like i knew how to spell asian for so long and then like last year or sthing i started questioning how to spell it and i’d search it up and i’d forget 3 seconds later about where the “i” went and so idk what was happening to me but i just couldn’t spell it right and for this post, i made sure to remember where the i comes in asian.
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SHDHSGSTSHSJDHHSN ILSA
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THANKS FOR THE GIANT LIST OF ASIAN REP BOOKS. i’ve been looking to add diversity to my tbr and this helps loads, so thanks for the recs 🤗☀
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UH YOUR WELCOME!!
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YAAAASSSS ❤ I'm so excited that you're also participating in YARC!! The books on your list so amazing and also so aesthetically pleasing 🙂 I read the Shatter Me series a few years back but don't really remember much now, so maybe this is the perfect excuse to reread it 😉
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I know I’m so excited myself!! And we should both re-read it that’d be awesome
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Also going for the Philippine Tarsier this year! I love A Thousand Splendid Suns, I think it’s my favourite of all Hosseini’s books but yes, it will 100% make you cry! I was a bit disappointed with And the Mountains Echoed – it felt a little patchwork and the ending was a little underwhelming, so maybe read this one first? Good luck!
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i don’t know if i’m ready to read splendid suns. i need to be in the right headspace so then i can cry and be emotionally invested aha. and im sorry you didn’t like Mountains that much! I still look forward to both ❤
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Wow I am so late to this *hides* but in my defense I only started blogging and blog hopping in July 2020! Hm Asian books I love — first thing that comes to mind: The Three Body Problem! Also finished The Dark Forest recently and am 14% through Death’s End (being weirdly specific here). Pretty sure that’s the only thing I can comment on, so…okay!
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