The Best Chinese Culture Books for Kids

Three sisters are left alone for a night, and the old woman who talks her way through the door is not their grandmother.

Minli spends her only two coins on a goldfish, then leaves home to ask the Old Man of the Moon how to change her family's fortune.

Pulled over on an Ohio roadside to gather watercress from a muddy ditch, a girl is embarrassed—until her mother explains why.

Three monks arrive at a village where nobody answers the door, so they start boiling stones in the square.

The Emperor gives every child in the kingdom a seed and promises his throne to whoever grows the best flower. Ping's pot stays empty.

Little Star's mother bakes a mooncake and leaves it in the night sky to cool. Little Star is told not to touch it.

Ten-year-old Mia runs the front desk of a California motel while her parents clean the rooms, and hides the guests her boss would throw out.

The Jade Emperor announces a race across a river, and the first twelve animals to finish get a year named after them.

Mr. Haktak digs up a brass pot that doubles everything dropped inside. Then Mrs. Haktak falls in.

Amy can fold every kind of dumpling except a bao, which keeps coming out lopsided no matter how carefully she watches her grandmother.

Where did fortune cookies come from? General Tso's chicken? Grace Lin goes through the takeout menu dish by dish.

In 1974 a farmer digging a well struck a clay head. Beneath the field stood an army of seven thousand soldiers, each with a different face.

A family sweeps out the old year, hangs the decorations, makes the dumplings, and waits for the fireworks.