Vietnamese Archives - BookDragon

The Good Asian (vol. 2) by Pornsak Pichetshote, illustrated by Alexandre Tefenkgi, colored by Lee Loughridge [in Booklist]

01 Jun, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, French, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Repost, Thai American, Vietnamese, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW To best appreciate this volume, readers must go back to the first book. Pornsak Pichetshote’s exquisite narration is an intricate temporal puzzle, his scenes moving between past and present, revealing just enough partial (scintillating, shocking, shrewd) backstory each time with many threads that require careful...

The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen [in Booklist]

17 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, South Asian American, Southeast Asian, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW The magic happens here on every page, the perfection personified by debut author/artist Trung Le Nguyen’s autobiographical homage to the infinite power of storytelling. The opening page ingeniously distinguishes three interwoven narratives with three color palettes: red is the urgent now, about young Tiến...

The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai + Author Interview [in The Booklist Reader]

01 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Vietnamese

Filling a Lack of Voices from Inside Việt Nam: Talking with Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai Thousands of Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’s devoted readers should have been meeting her live over these next few weeks to hear about The Mountains Sing, her first novel in English. But an unprecedented...

The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai [in Booklist]

18 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Vietnamese

A granddaughter and her grandmother take turns narrating: “If our stories survive, we will not die, even when our bodies are no longer here on this earth.” What emerges is the ominous history of 20th-century Việt Nam told through four generations of a single family. As...

Five More to Go: Paul Yoon’s Run Me to Earth [in The Booklist Reader]

29 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, African, Arab, Audio, British, Cambodian, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, European, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Lists, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Sri Lankan American, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

Run Me to Earth by Paul Yoon Traversing countries and continents during a half-century, Paul Yoon’s (The Mountain, 2017) second novel unfolds decades of unrelenting loss and meaningless brutality, balanced – somehow – by exquisite kindness and unbreakable bonds. In war-torn Laos, a country brutalized by...

Booklist Backlist: Fictional Worlds, Real Meals [in Booklist]

16 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, African, Arab, Arab American, Black/African American, Canadian, Cuban, Cuban American, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Iranian, Iranian American, Japanese, Korean, Latina/o/x, Lebanese, Lebanese American, Lists, Nonethnic-specific, Persian, Persian American, Repost, Southeast Asian American, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

Yeah, sure: Proust and his madeleine-dipped-in-tea set the barometer for toothsome leitmotifs. I admit to the possibility that my academic indoctrination in his long, long musings made me quite the hungry reader. Or maybe I’m just always greedy for nourishment, with preferences in the belly...

Butterfly Yellow by Thanhhà Lại [in Shelf Awareness]

15 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Fiction, Repost, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

In April 1975, the U.S. implemented Operation Babylift, a mass evacuation of children from South Việt Nam. As the country imploded, 12-year-old Hằng – who looked 8 – and her 5-year-old brother, Linh – who passed for 3 – presented themselves at the airport as...

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong [in Library Journal]

13 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW The cover calls this a novel, but the autobiographical overlaps are many: a gay Vietnamese American poet, an October birth outside Saigon, an other-side-of-the-world escape, a biracial single mother, a Hartford, CT, upbringing, a New York City education. In his prose debut, T.S. Eliot-prized,...

Core Collection: Refugee Stories [in Booklist]

06 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, African, Arab, British, Cuban, Cuban American, European, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Iranian, Iraqi, Italian, Jewish, Lists, Memoir, Middle Eastern, Nonfiction, Repost, Syrian, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

More than 65 million people, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, have been forced to leave their homes. Whether they are made refugees in another country or displaced internally, 2017 UN data shows that “nearly 20 people are forcibly displaced every minute as a...

Inheriting the War: Poetry & Prose by Descendants of Vietnam Veterans and Refugees edited by Laren McClung [in Booklist]

14 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Poetry, Repost, Short Stories, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

"The language of war turns the other into an object – the language of literature humanizes,” writes Laren McClung in her introduction to a collection featuring 61 contributors (and five translators) – 62 counting Yusef Komunyakaa’s resonating preface – each intimately affected by the Vietnam...

13 Terrifying Tales of Diverse Hauntings [in The Booklist Reader]

25 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, African, Black/African American, British, Chinese, Chinese American, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Indian, Indian American, Japanese, Japanese American, Lists, Malaysian, Repost, Short Stories, Singaporean, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

It’s the time of the year to be scared witless – and by choice, egads! Gluttons for fear, unite. And brace yourselves for the following 13 diverse hauntings. The Black Isle by Sandi Tan The protagonist begins her life as Ling, the first-born twin in a well-to-do Shanghai clan. Half...

The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui + Author Interview [in Bloom]

13 Jun, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Nonfiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

Q&A with Thi Bui: Writer, Illustrator, Teacher On the cover of Thi Bui’s The Best We Could Do: An Illustrated Memoir is a perfect quote: “A book to break our heart and heal it,” blurbs fellow Vietnamese American refugee and 2016 Pulitzer Prize winner for fiction...

Adrift at Sea: A Vietnamese Boy’s Story of Survival by Marsha Forchuck Skrypuch with Tuan Ho, illustrated by Brian Deines

17 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Biography, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Children/Picture Books, Nonfiction, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

Prodigious Canadian author Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch has built an admirable, award-winning reputation by writing about difficult subjects for younger readers, including the Armenian genocide, world wars, and Canadian internment. Her previous focus on the Vietnam War featured survivor/refugee Son Thi Anh Tuyet in a two-part...

The Refugee Experience for Middle Grade and YA Readers [in The Booklist Reader]

13 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Afghan, African, Arab, Biography, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Caribbean, Cuban, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Iranian, Iranian American, Iraqi, Italian, Lists, Memoir, Middle Eastern, Middle Grade Readers, Myanmarese (Burmese), Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Poetry, Repost, Verse Novel/Nonfiction, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

This is the second in a two-part series of recommended books for youth about the refugee experience. For a list of picture books, click here. Canada, with her groovin' President, functional healthcare system, and more welcoming borders, is currently in the throes of "Month 13," the first month following...

Help Young Readers Understand the Refugee Experience with Picture Books [in The Booklist Reader]

13 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in African, Arab, Arab American, Australian, Bilingual, Biography, Cambodian, Cambodian American, Canadian, Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Iraqi, Korean American, Latin American, Lists, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Syrian, Translation, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

This is the first in a two-part series of recommended books for youth about the refugee experience. For a list of middle grade and YA titles, click here. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), also known as the United Nations Refugee Agency,...

The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen [in Library Journal]

12 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Repost, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

*STARRED REVIEW Although publishing 10 months after Viet Thanh Nguyen won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for The Sympathizer, this collection precedes his novel by decades (the earliest entry dates from 1997). In a pre-Pulitzer interview, Nguyen credits his 15-year experience "characterized by drudgery and despair, laced with...

Discover WeNeedDiverseBooks with Thanhhà Lại’s Listen, Slowly

31 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Middle Grade Readers, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, WeNeedDiverseBooks, WNDB.SummerReadingSeries2015

Dragonfish by Vu Tran + Author Interview [in Bloom]

05 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Author Interview/Profile, Fiction, Repost, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

“This man who once saved your life, he is not a bad man. Nor a good one,” a mother writes her daughter. “I have long given up on what it means exactly to be either. But I am confident now that you must know one...

In a Village by the Sea by Muon Van, illustrated by April Chu

27 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, South Asian, South Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

As minimal as the text might initially appear, Muon Van’s debut picture book is as deep as the Sea she references in her title. The resplendently rendered story seems simple: a family awaits for the safe return home of the fisherman father. But, of course,...

Listen, Slowly by Thanhhà Lại

08 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Middle Grade Readers, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American

"They're his roots, not mine," Mia insists as she seethes on a flight bound to Vietnam with her father. "I'm a Laguna Beach girl who can paddleboard one-legged and live on fish tacos and mango smoothies. My parents should be thanking the Buddha for a...

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