Mochi Magazine

"Masquerade, paper faces on parade," sings the crowd. "Masquerade, hide your face, so the world will never find you." Dressed in a slinky black gown and lace mask, I raise my champagne glass and repeat the lyrics, ones I've heard countless times since I was a child, but never got to join in on before. Dancers pirouette around the audience, cast as the performance's "madames and monsieurs," and butlers lead us through the candle-lit labyrinth of the Paris Opera House.

"Two Lives With You" Lauren Ho Fiction (June 1, 2026, Mindy's Book Studio) Simran Gopal is living out her dream Bollywood romance when she returns to the family home she's been avoiding for the last seven years to take part in a two-week Indian wedding for her cousin. Family drama is already at a high when Leo Bridgers, Simran ' s new boyfriend, accidentally crashes the engagement party. To avoid full crisis mode, the cousins need to rally.

Like many creatives, Agnes Song picked up knitting and, later, crochet during the COVID-19 pandemic. At the time, she was a full-time bioengineering student merely looking for a hobby to distract from the monotony of quarantine. "I fell in love with [knitting] instantly," Song said. "It felt like a great intersection between artistry and engineering." Though she didn't know much about social media at the time, Song started documenting her crafting process as a way of connecting with others online.

In an industry increasingly addicted to digital shortcuts, "The Furious" insists on doing things the hard way. Whether it's a blind hammer toss between two actors that took 32 takes or a five-person brawl featuring hand-to-hand combat for nearly 15 minutes straight, the film insists on real bodies doing real damage.

When Ann M. Ishimaru talks about leadership, she does not begin with titles or authority. She begins with relationships. A Japanese American Yonsei scholar, educator, and author, Ishimaru is the Killinger Endowed Chair and professor of Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Policy at the University of Washington College of Education.

Once Keith had vocalized the nerve-shattering words "I want a divorce," Sabira was forced to stop being afraid. Why? A soft voice whispered in her ear. Why be so scared? What are you scared of? She was scared of herself. She didn't know what she was made of. She was a mass of bones and muscle and some other stuff that she didn't know very much about. Embedded in that were a bunch of thoughts and memories that were further embedded with fears and worries and a whole lot of pain.

I stepped out of baggage claim's automatic glass doors into the familiar rush of heavy, muggy air and the scent of exhaust fumes from cars anxiously waiting to locate their person. Usually, my brother Albert picks me up whenever I visit my family in Houston. That's just who he is: a fiercely loyal, dependable, ever-dutiful son, husband, and brother. But today, he was busy picking up his two young girls from school, so I was relieved of the guilt I have always felt receiving a ride from him.

Growing up in the San Gabriel Valley (SGV) outside Los Angeles, Giaae Kwon occupied a large part of her life through church. Her parents were very involved in their local Korean American Presbyterian church, and Kwon enjoyed the easy friendships she formed with the youth there. "I was deep in it," Kwon recalls. "For me, church was my primary social circle." Kwon isn't alone.

Contemporary artist Monali Ghosh creates work that ties beauty with purpose - vivid, large-scale paintings that are as much about sustainability as they are about art. Her canvases, often inspired by the ocean and blooms, are built using nontoxic pigments, recycled materials, and reworked canvases, reflecting her ethos that her art should not only depict the planet, but also protect it.

Isabel J. Kim’s subversive debut novel “Sublimation” prompts you to think about how far you might go to live the choice you didn’t make, in an extended thought experiment on the immigrant experience. In the book, crossing a border doesn’t just change the trajectory of your life — it quite literally splits you into two versions of yourself. One version of you, your “instance,” is left behind, while the other enters a new country.