Coming To America - Stories Of Immigration

Bibliography created by the Schaumburg Township District Library

Stories about boys and girls moving from a foreign country to America.
FICTION AVI	*Silent Movie* by Avi. In the early years of the twentieth century, a Swedish family encounters separation and other hardships upon immigrating to New York City until the son is cast in a silent movie.
FICTION BARTOLETTI, S.	*A Coal Miner’s Bride: the Diary of Anetka Kaminska* by Susan Campbell Bartoletti. (Polish) A diary account of thirteen-year-old Anetka’s life in Poland in 1896, immigration to America, marriage to a coal miner, widowhood, and happiness in finally finding her true love.
FICTION BARTOLETTI, S.	*Silver at Night* by Susan Campbell Bartoletti. (Italian) Massimino leaves Italy to work in the American coal mines and slowly saves enough silver to pay the passage of his fiancee.
FICTION BROWN, J.	*Little Cricket* by Jackie Brown. (Hmong) After the upheaval of the Vietnam War reaches them, twelve-year-old Kia and her Hmong family flee from the mountains of Laos to a refugee camp in Thailand and eventually to the alien world of Saint Paul, Minnesota.
FICTION CHENG, A.	*Eclipse* by Andrea Cheng. In Cincinnati, Ohio, in the summer of 1952, eight-year-old Peti gives up his room to his Hungarian relatives, including a twelve-year-old cousin who bullies him, and worries about his grandfather who cannot escape from behind the Iron curtain.
FICTION COHEN, B.	*Molly's Pilgrim* by Barbara Cohen. (Russian) Told to make a doll like a pilgrim for the Thanksgiving display at school, Molly's mother dresses the doll in clothes like Molly wore before she left Russia.
FICTION DANTICAT, E.	*Behind the Mountains* by Edwidge Danticat. Writing in the notebook which her teacher gave her, thirteen-year-old Celiane describes life with her mother and brother in Haiti as well as her experiences in Brooklyn after the family finally immigrates there to be reunited with her father.
FICTION JR-HI DE LA CRUZ, M.	*Fresh Off the Boat* by Melissa de la Cruz. When her family emigrates from the Philippines to San Francisco, California, fourteen-year-old Vicenza Armbullo struggles to fit in at her exclusive, all-girl private school.
FICTION DENENBERG, B.	*One Eye Laughing, the Other Weeping: the Diary of Julie Weiss* by Barry Denenberg. (Austrian) During the Nazi persecution of the Jews in Austria, twelve-year-old Julie escapes to America to live with her relatives in New York City.
FICTION JR-HI DURBIN, W.	*The Darkest Evening* by William Durbin. In the 1930s, a young Finnish-American boy reluctantly moves with his family to Karelia, a communist-Finnish state founded in Russia, where his idealistic father soon realizes that his conception of a communist utopia is flawed.
FICTION GIFF, P.	*A House of Tailors* by Patricia Reilly Giff. When thirteen-year-old Dina emigrates from Germany to America in 1871, her only wish is to return home as soon as she can, but as the months pass and she survives a multitude of hardships living with her uncle and his young wife and baby, she finds herself thinking of Brooklyn as her home.
EASY GILMORE, R.	*Lights for Gita* by Rachna Gilmore. (East Indian) A recent immigrant from India, Gita is looking forward to celebrating her favorite holiday, Divali, a festival of lights, but things are so different in her new home that she wonders if she will ever adjust.
FICTION HAZEN, B.	*Katie’s Wish* by Barbara Shook Hazen. Soon after Katie wishes for her potatoes to disappear during dinner, a potato famine ravages her native Ireland, forcing her to leave for America.
FICTION HESSE, K.	*Letters from Rifka* by Karen Hesse. (Russian) In letters to her cousin, a young Jewish girl chronicles her family's flight from Russia in 1919 and her own experiences when she is left in Belgium as others immigrate to America.
FICTION HEST, A.	*When Jessie Came Across the Sea* by Amy Hest. (Jewish) A thirteen-year-old Jewish orphan reluctantly leaves her grandmother and immigrates to New York City, where she works for three years sewing lace and earning money to bring Grandmother to the United States, too.
FICTION HIMELBLAU, L.	*The Trouble Begins* by Linda Himelblau. Reunited with his family for the first time since he was a baby, fifth grader Du struggles to adapt to his new home in the United States.
FICTION HOLM, J.	*Our Only May Amelia* by Jennifer L. Holm. (Finland) As the only girl in a Finnish American family of seven brothers, May Amelia Jackson resents being expected to act like a lady while growing up in Washington state in 1899.
FICTION LASKY, K.	*Hope in My Heart* by Kathryn Lasky. After her family immigrates to America from Italy in 1903, ten-year-old Sofia is quarantined at the Ellis Island Immigration Station where she makes a good friend but endures nightmarish conditions.
FICTION LEE, M.	*Landed* by Milly Lee. After leaving his village in southeastern China, twelve-year-old Sun is held at Angel Island, San Francisco, before being released to join his father, a merchant living in the area.
FICTION LOMBARD, J.	*Drita, My Homegirl* by Jenny Lombard. When ten-year-old Drita and her family, refugees from Kosovo, move to New York, Drita is teased about not speaking English well, but after a popular student named Maxine is forced to learn about Kosovo as a punishment for teasing Drita, the two girls soon bond.
FICTION LOOK, L.	*Ruby Lu, Empress of Everything* by Lenore Look. After Ruby Lu’s deaf cousin, Flying Duck, and her parents come from China to live with her, Ruby finds life challenging as she adjusts to her new family, tries to mend her rocky relationship with her friend Emma, and faces various adventures in summer school.
FICTION MARSDEN, C.	*The Jade Dragon* by Carolyn Marsden. A Chinese American girl torn between her family’s traditional values and the more modern ones in her second grade classroom learns that friendship cannot be bought.
FICTION MEAD, A.	*Swimming to America* by Alice Mead. Eighth grader Linda Berati struggles to understand who she is within the context of her mother’s secrecy about the family background, her discomfort with her old girlfriends, her involvement with the family problems of her Cuban-American friend Ramon, and an opportunity to attend a school for “free spirits” like herself.
FICTION MOHR, N.	*The Magic Shell* by Nicholasa Mohr. (Dominican Republican) When his family moves from the Dominican Republic to New York City, Jaime uses his uncle's magical shell to call up happy memories.
FICTION NAGDA, A.	*Dear Whiskers* by Ann Whitehead Nagda. (Saudi Arabian) Jenny is discouraged when her second grade pen pal turns out to be a new student from Saudi Arabia who does not speak English very well, but as she works with her, they slowly become friends.
FICTION NAPOLI, D.	*The King of Mulberry Street* by Donna Jo Napoli. In 1892, Dom, a nine-year old stowaway from Naples, Italy, arrives in New York and must learn to survive the perils of street life in the big city.
FICTION NISLICK, J.	Zayda Was a Cowboy by June Levitt Nislick. When a Jewish grandfather comes to live with his son’s family, he relates his experiences fleeing Eastern Europe for America, his adventures as a cowboy, and his assimilation into American culture.
FICTION NIXON, J.	*Land of Dreams* by Joan Lowery Nixon. (Swedish) In 1902, sixteen-year-old Kristin travels with her family from Sweden to a new life in Minnesota, where she finds herself frustrated by the restrictions placed on girls her age.
FICTION JR-HI NIXON, J.	*Land of Promise* by Joan Lowery Nixon. (Irish) In 1902, fifteen-year-old Rose travels from Ireland to join her family members in Chicago where she must deal with her father's drinking and her brother's dangerous political activities.
FICTION JR-HI SACHS, M.	*Lost in America* by Marilyn Sachs. Follows the experiences of Nicole, a teenaged French Jew, from 1943 to 1948, as she loses her parents and sister to the concentration camps and then leaves her native France to make a new life for herself in New York City.
EASY SAY, A.	*Grandfather's Journey* by Allen Say. (Japanese) A Japanese American man recounts his grandfather's journey to America which he later also undertakes, and the feelings of being torn by a love for two different countries.
FICTION JR-HI VECIANA-SUAREZ, A.	*The Flight to Freedom* by Ana Veciana-Suarez. Writing in the diary which her father gave her, thirteen-year-old Yara describes life with her family in Havana, Cuba, in 1967 as well as her experiences in Miami, Florida, after immigrating there to be reunited with some relatives while leaving others behind.
FICTION WOODRUFF, E.	*The Orphan of Ellis Island: a Time Travel Adventure* by Elvira Woodruff. (Italian) During a school trip to Ellis Island, Dominick Avaro, a ten-year-old foster child, travels back in time to 1908 Italy and accompanies two young emigrants to America.