An only child raised by a Chinese immigrant mother in west Los Angeles, she spent a lot of time in bookstores. But it seemed that the stories she connected to most — those written by immigrants and people of color — were often relegated to a single shelf or a heritage month display.
“I just wanted to walk into a place where I didn’t have to search that much,” she said.
“I think that the publishing industry didn’t think that they were going to sell or didn’t think that people were interested in our stories,” Yu added. “But they had always been there and these authors and these writers and these stories have always been there.”
Yu sees room for progress in publishing
Despite this, Yu didn’t set out to open an Asian American bookstore.
When she first conceived of her small business, she dreamed of a space that would reflect the rich diversity of her community. She envisioned a place dedicated to stories written by immigrants and people of color — which happened to include Asian American authors.
The space still reflects her vision. Aim perhaps because of Yu’s own Asian American identity, perhaps because of her bookstore’s historic location or perhaps because of a hunger among Asian Americans for authentic depictions of their communities, Yu and Me Books has since become a go-to for Asian American readers hoping to find their experiences reflected on its shelves.
“It’s been really interesting seeing how I’ve kind of been pushed into the Asian American bookstores lane,” she said. “I think that if I weren’t Asian American, I may not have had to put myself within that slot.”
While Yu has held to her mission of highlighting stories of immigrants and people of color more broadly, she’s leaned into customers’ demand for books by Asian American authors. Most of her inventory now skews toward Asian American books, she said — making Yu and Me Books a rare and special place.
“As someone who’s thinking about my own identity and also a business owner, I want to be able to support whoever wants to come in and find books that represent themselves,” she said. “But I love that there is a lot of love and desire for Asian American books and representation.”
Still, Yu makes it a point to both challenge and delight visitors to her store.
“One of my favorite things that I hear when customers come in the store (is), ‘I’ve never heard of this title before’ or ‘I’ve never seen like 40% of this inventory before.'” Yu said. “That makes me so happy because you can connect to a story that’s not necessarily being pushed by publishers.”
As Yu and Me Books celebrates and showcases the breadth of works that Asian American writers have produced over decades, Yu also encourages her visitors to keep an open mind.
“I also try to remind readers as much as I can that outside the Asian American experience, there’s so many books written by other immigrants that we can relate to very much,” she added.
In the time that Yu and Me Books has been open, Yu said she’s seen positive changes in the publishing industry. She’s seeing more diversity in the authors who are getting published, but those authors are often called upon to be “educators of our experience,” Yu said. As exciting as it is to see these experiences represented authentically, she hopes the industry will reach a point where authors can transcend their identities.
“I want authors of color to just write about unicorns or cupcakes — whatever they want to write about,” she added.
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