{"id":2833,"date":"2009-06-06T08:37:52","date_gmt":"2009-06-06T12:37:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookdragon.si.edu\/?p=2833"},"modified":"2022-08-27T10:52:50","modified_gmt":"2022-08-27T14:52:50","slug":"all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/","title":{"rendered":"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"all<\/a>Not only will you be unable to put this down, you’ll have to be careful to remember to breathe while reading this unforgettable debut novel written entirely in free verse. By age 10, Matt Pin has already had a harrowing life as a child of war. As one of the first groups of children airlifted out of an imploding Vietnam, Matt begins life anew on the other side of the world with a\u00a0welcoming mother, father, and little brother. He remains haunted\u00a0by memories of his birthmother and little brother, even while he refuses to intone\u00a0the name of his abandoning American birthfather.<\/p>\n

Although young Matt left death behind, he cannot escape\u00a0the relentless nightmares.\u00a0He fears his new family, as gentle and loving as they are, will send him back if they ever found out what really happened in Vietnam. When he makes the baseball team at school, he is bullied by a teammate who lost his older brother to war: “My brother died<\/em> \/ because of you<\/em>.”\u00a0He finds solace in the music he begins to play, lessons given by a gentle Vietnam vet named Jeff. When Matt finally finds the courage to tell his own story, he not only begins to heal himself, but the many survivors of a senseless war who have come home to broken lives: “She gave her child to a bunch<\/em> \/ of American soldiers …<\/em> \/ Jeff emphasizes the first syllable \/ in soldier \/ as if it were soul<\/em>diers, \/ … so we must have done<\/em> \/ something good<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Surely this\u00a0actual\u00a0book \u2013 its amazingly smooth pages that\u00a0literally provide tactile comfort\u00a0with\u00a0each haunting page,\u00a0the bass clef (which looks like half a heart in memory of the missing beloved family Matt left behind) that announces each section, and blank\u00a0staff lines (waiting to be filled with the music of his new life)\u00a0that mark their pause\u00a0\u2013\u00a0is\u00a0also one of the best examples of why Kindles and other such techno-gadgets can’t ever replace real life books.<\/p>\n

And yes, I do have one, only because it was a generous gift to Luddite me. Yes, it sat on my shelves for nine months until I found out I could read manuscripts that people seem to want to send me because my old eyeballs just can’t read off a computer anymore and I feel too guilty printing out massive reams of sacrificed trees. But you’ll have to pry that final book out of my gnarled hands when they finally put me away for good. For now, no Kindle-version of this book is available … it’s a sign! You’ll have to read the actual phenomenal book.<\/p>\n

Readers<\/strong>: Middle Grade, Young Adult, Adult<\/p>\n

Published<\/strong>: 2009<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not only will you be unable to put this down, you’ll have to be careful to remember to breathe while reading this unforgettable debut novel written entirely in free verse. By age 10, Matt Pin has already had a harrowing life as a child of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25237,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[121,5,6,197,30,94,136,137,7933,140,31],"tags":[82,2536,905,6608,58,10,189,11,145,39,432,44,45],"class_list":["post-2833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-absolute-favorites","category-adult-readers","category-fiction","category-hapa","category-middle-grade-readers","category-poetry","category-southeast-asian","category-southeast-asian-american","category-verse-novel","category-vietnamese-american","category-young-adult-readers","tag-adoption","tag-all-the-broken-pieces","tag-ann-e-burg","tag-bookdragon","tag-coming-of-age","tag-family","tag-father-son-relationship","tag-friendship","tag-mixed-race-issues","tag-parent-child-relationship","tag-refugees","tag-siblings","tag-war"],"yoast_head":"\nall the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg - BookDragon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg - BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Not only will you be unable to put this down, you’ll have to be careful to remember to breathe while reading this unforgettable debut novel written entirely in free verse. By age 10, Matt Pin has already had a harrowing life as a child of...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-06-06T12:37:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-08-27T14:52:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2014\/04\/all-the-broken-pieces1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"964\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@SmithsonianAPA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg - BookDragon","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg - BookDragon","og_description":"Not only will you be unable to put this down, you’ll have to be careful to remember to breathe while reading this unforgettable debut novel written entirely in free verse. By age 10, Matt Pin has already had a harrowing life as a child of...","og_url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/","og_site_name":"BookDragon","article_published_time":"2009-06-06T12:37:52+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-08-27T14:52:50+00:00","og_image":[{"width":600,"height":964,"url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2014\/04\/all-the-broken-pieces1.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@SmithsonianAPA","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/","url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/","name":"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg - BookDragon","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-06-06T12:37:52+00:00","dateModified":"2022-08-27T14:52:50+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/a00f6dcfcb279c75f3f992ad2919d51d"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/all-the-broken-pieces-a-novel-in-verse-by-ann-e-burg\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"all the broken pieces: a novel in verse by Ann E. Burg"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#website","url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/","name":"BookDragon","description":"Books for the Diverse Reader","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/a00f6dcfcb279c75f3f992ad2919d51d","name":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/79b5f08575e8962bd00388cd126d374b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/79b5f08575e8962bd00388cd126d374b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/twitter.com\/@SmithsonianAPA"],"url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/author\/riemert\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2833"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2833"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49765,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2833\/revisions\/49765"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}