Naomi Hirahara Books in Order

A reference collection profiling 96 Asian American business leaders. Hirahara traces their education, careers, setbacks, and achievements across fields from technology and fashion to food, entertainment, and corporate life.

Los Angeles gardener Mas Arai is haunted by secrets from Hiroshima when an old acquaintance is murdered. To protect himself and uncover the truth, he must confront the past he has spent decades trying to outrun.

Mas Arai travels to New York after an anxious call from his estranged daughter, Mari. When her wealthy boss is found dead, Mas reluctantly investigates, hoping to protect his family while facing years of hurt between father and daughter.

A friend's improbable casino win ends in murder, leaving Mas Arai with a battered Okinawan shamisen as his best clue. His search follows a dangerous trail of secrets from Los Angeles to Okinawa.

Twelve-year-old Angela is sent to stay with her grandparents in Gardena while her parents' marriage falls apart. Working in the family's flower shop and folding origami cranes, she begins to understand her relatives and herself.

Mas Arai agrees to be best man at his friend Haruo's wedding, until a treasured Japanese doll display disappears and the engagement collapses. Clearing Haruo's name leads Mas into old memories, deception, and murder.

Mas returns to Watsonville for a cousin's funeral and becomes caught up in the murder of a young woman. The strawberry fields of his youth hold buried resentments, a crop disease, and a clue to another possible killing.

Rookie LAPD bicycle cop Ellie Rush dreams of homicide work, then finds a former college classmate dead. With help and interference from family, friends, and fellow officers, she follows a case someone is desperate to bury.

While patrolling near a Los Angeles concert hall, Ellie Rush finds a gardener dying at the foot of a staircase. A missing cellist and a supposedly stolen multimillion-dollar cello convince her that the official story is wrong.

At Dodger Stadium during the World Baseball Classic, Mas Arai is pulled into the murder of a sportswriter. Threats, deleted files, and questions about loyalty turn a baseball event into a dangerous investigation.

Mas travels to Hiroshima to deliver his best friend's ashes to a relative on a small island. When a teenage boy dies under troubling circumstances, Mas cannot leave until he finds a way to bring the truth to light.

Using oral histories, archival material, and photographs, this history follows Japanese Americans after wartime incarceration. It examines resettlement, discrimination, housing shortages, and the ways families rebuilt lives in unfamiliar places.

Leilani Santiago returns from Seattle to Kaua'i to help with her family's shave ice stand after her mother becomes ill. When a young surfer is found dead and her father is blamed, Leilani starts asking dangerous questions.

A photo-rich history of Southern California's flower industry and the Japanese American growers who helped build it. Hirahara follows families through restrictive laws, the Depression, wartime incarceration, and a changing Los Angeles.

In 1944 Chicago, Aki Ito's family has just been released from Manzanar when her older sister dies beneath a train. Officials call it suicide, but Aki investigates the life and secrets Rose left behind.

During the pandemic, Leilani and her sisters rescue an unidentified woman from the water off Kaua'i. A rare lei connects the woman to Leilani's best friend and a flower business, opening a case with deadly consequences.

An illustrated collection introducing 30 Asian American and Pacific Islander figures who shaped the United States. Their stories span culture, politics, science, activism, and community life, while placing individual achievements in historical context.

After returning to Los Angeles following wartime incarceration, Aki Ito works as a nurse's aide while her community struggles to rebuild. Suspicious injuries and a murder in Little Tokyo threaten to draw her family into danger.

In 1903 Pasadena, Japanese immigrant Ryui Wada begins work as an art dealer's apprentice. When a painting is stolen from artist Toshio Aoki, Ryui and his photographer roommate investigate amid rising anti-Japanese hostility.