The Waiting Years

A mesmerizing true story of a young Hmong girl in Minnesota that celebrates the immigrant experience.

At fourteen years old, Kalia feels like two different girls. At home, she is the reliable daughter who makes dinner and takes care of her younger siblings, while her older sister is in class and her parents work long hours. But at school, she is silent, shy—waiting for the day her life will really begin. 

Kalia and her family are Hmong refugees who have immigrated to St. Paul, Minnesota, into a tiny, dilapidated house. The Waiting Years takes us through Kalia’s high school years, as she struggles to find her voice in a place she feels she doesn’t belong. She records it all in her journals—her crushes on boys and attempts to pass the driver’s test, as well as her insecurities and struggle with lupus, a debilitating auto-immune disease.   

The Waiting Years is a moving memoir of a storyteller’s formative years, honoring her past and forging her future, that celebrates an immigrant community in Minnesota, from award-winning author of The Latehomecomer, Kao Kalia Yang.