Kimchi and calamari is a quirky food fusion — and exactly how fourteen-year-old Joseph Calderaro feels about himself. Why wouldn’t an adopted Korean drummer feel like a combo platter given (1) his face in the mirror and (2) his proud Italian family? Now Joseph has to write an ancestry essay for school. But all he knows is that his birth family put his diapered butt on a plane to the USA.

What Joseph does leads to a catastrophe messier than a table of shattered dishes — and self-discovery that he never could have imagined.

KIMCHI & CALAMARI was picked by READ ON WISCONSIN, Wisconsin's statewide reading initiative, as a book-of-the-month selection for 2008.

Book Info:

• ISBN (Hardcover): 0-06-083769-1
  
• ISBN-13 (Hardcover): 978-0-06-083769-3
  
• ISBN (Library Binding): 0-06-083770-5
  
• ISBN-13 (Library Binding): 978-0-06-083770-9
  
• Release date: April 10, 2007
  
• Pages: 240

I think that this book will be a great one for my daughter as she gets older and wonders about her own heritage and tries to figure out who she is. I don’t know of another book for middle grade kids that approaches adoption and birth family searches in such an authentic, yet age-appropriate way…
—A YEAR OF READING

"Kent has done an excellent job of creating a likable protagonist whose confusion about his status is touching, and also funny."
– School Library Journal

“No matter what their backgrounds, your guys will relate to Joseph’s fast-paced, funny, coming-of-age saga, and his struggles with his heritage." – Scholastic Instructor’s Magazine,  Teacher’s Pick for New Kid’s Books, March/April 2007

“This will have special appeal for adoptees, but the questions about family roots that Kent raises are universal. “ – ALA Booklist Review, Feb. 15, 2007

Check out more info about Kimchi and Calamari here!