Reviews with content warning for Homophobia - On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

I knew full well going into it that Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous was not going to play to my preferred tastes and interests at all, but I still wanted to give it a try anyway to expand my reading experiences. Unfortunately my initial impression was right. Despite how much I wanted to like the novel for its earnest, ambitious aspirations and to connect with the powerful content and memories, this was a complete stylistic miss for me. On Earth there were briefly moments that were impactful where I thought I would experience what so many others have loved in Ocean Vuong’s debut novel, but the presentation constantly disappointed me and ruined each moving moment rather than enhancing it.

Ordinarily I would and should’ve DNF’d this, but I stuck it out with hopes that it would get better since I was recommended this from a friend; it did slightly to an extent. Divided into three parts loosely based around Little Dog’s childhood, adolescence, and young adult/reflective years, I found the 3rd part to be the most impactful and moving. Focusing on themes of death, mortality, addiction, and familial caregiving, these themes were ones that I could understand and connect with the most compared to themes or feelings that were presented in the first two parts. The loss of a particular person that is redacted for spoilers was easily the most interesting part for me, one because of the context and impact this person had on Little Dog, but also because there were less excessive metaphors and poetic messing around.

At first I thought the metaphors layered with social and societal commentary were interesting and affected. However the initial interest faded along with my patience for how little narrative content there was, filled and covered by so much abstract poetry. What started off as insightful connections quickly began to feel like constant reaching, with random phrases or off-hand tangents at every turn. The attempts at poetic connections and lyrical phrasing felt oddly impersonal and fragmented, which is at odds with the otherwise personal content. Sometimes less is more, I would’ve loved a more contained presentation that would allow the inspiring content and powerful narration to speak for itself. And to be clear, it’s not that I didn’t understand what the book was trying to do, far from that. I can tell a lot of love and effort was put in but ultimately the finished product felt like a mess and didn’t really give me a reason to care.

Despite being Asian American myself, I sometimes have a hard time reading or appreciating written portrayals or reflections on said Asian American experiences. This one however, appealed to me even less than others due to how convoluted the recollected “memories” were written. There were occasional moments that I thought were brilliant written, for example the following:

<blockquote>I am thinking of freedom again, how the calf is most free when the cage opens and it’s led to the truck for slaughter (calves raised for veal). All freedom is relative–you know too well-and sometimes it’s not freedom at all, nut simply the cage widening far away from you, the bars abstracted with distance but still there, as when they “free” wild animals into nature preserves only to contain them yet again by larger borders. But I took it anyway, that widening. Because sometimes not seeing the bars is enough.”</blockquote>

Unfortunately for every quote or metaphor I thought was well done, there were another dozen metaphors or references that I felt had little relevancy or connection. I’ve read a few reviews that condemn Vuong’s writing for being pretentious, but that wasn’t the impression I got. Rather, I found the writing to be too free-flowing and ridiculously abstract. The memoir elements feel like a constant stream of thoughts, with no filter or editing. There were many times where I would start to get invested, only for the writing to go off on a metaphorical tangent (sometimes appropriately but more often randomly) and eventually loop back at the end after disrupting the flow. Other times Vuong would try to connect two different memories or concepts and ping pong back and forth with little finesse. Perhaps I’m too analytical and logical to follow or appreciate the artistic liberties at play, but I spent so much time re-reading stanzas, sitting there baffled at whatever the book was attempting, eventually getting it, then progressively losing my patience at how excessively unnecessary the prose was. The book also has a tendency to present events out of chronological order and ordinarily this is not a problem. However these events are connected to each other loosely by feeling(?) or theme, but the concept is so unfocused that the narration and moment feel lost and all over the place. I hoped that by the end of the book, the separate pieces and themes would be drawn together or somehow connect to the title, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. Sadly the book didn’t do that, and the title concept is only really referenced in the closing two chapters with callbacks to part 1’s contents, yet few to part 2 or 3’s. And that’s disappointing since a lot of the individual content across all three parts seemed like excellent material to work with and something I would’ve appreciated if handled differently.

At the end of the day, I don’t regret picking this up to read as it’s a unique novel. However, I can’t say that I enjoyed reading it, both subjectively and objectively. I think that for those who are more empathetic or free-flowing thinkers, this writing style and collection of memoir moments are powerful and moving. But it just didn’t work at all for me. In many ways, the book is written like a memoir despite having loosely-inspired (yet also fictional? I don’t understand where the line is drawn) novel-esque elements. But combined as a memoir and a fictional story, it somehow fails to really pull off either concept with problems associated with his signature prose. I originally rated this one star while writing this review, but ultimately barely bumped it up to a two (honestly it's like a 1.5) due to being briefly gorgeous at times and its high aspirations (also it’s an insult to compare this to some of the other 1-star books I’ve previously reviewed). But make no mistake, this was a terrible choice for my reading preference and I’m happy to now move on to something else.

Content Warnings

boywonder's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Content Warnings

eedle_cacleberry's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Ocean Vuong’s writing may be challenging to follow and understand, but that reflects the nature of memories.

Content Warnings

angelo_vossen's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

„I am thinking of beauty again, how some things are hunted because we have deemed them beautiful. If, relative to the history of our planet, an individual life is so short, a blink of an eye, as they say, then to be gorgeous, even from the day you're born to the day you die, is to be gorgeous only briefly.“

"On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous" by Ocean Vuong is a stunning debut novel that blends poetic language with a raw and intimate narrative. The novel is framed as a letter from the protagonist, Little Dog, to his illiterate mother, capturing the complexities of their relationship and the broader tapestry of their lives as Vietnamese immigrants in America.

Vuong's prose is lyrical and evocative, drawing on his background as a poet to create vivid imagery and deep emotional resonance. The novel delves into themes of identity, trauma, and the search for belonging, exploring how personal and collective histories shape the characters' lives. The narrative oscillates between past and present, weaving Little Dog's coming-of-age story with reflections on his family's experiences during the Vietnam War.

One of the novel's strengths is its exploration of intergenerational trauma and the immigrant experience, shedding light on the challenges faced by those straddling two cultures. Little Dog's struggles with his sexuality, his bond with his mother, and the haunting memories of his family's past are portrayed with unflinching honesty. Vuong also delves into topics like homophobia as for example portrayed in the following quote and the effects of society‘s expectations and pressure:

„The large boy took out a key chain and started scraping the paint off my bike. It came off so easily, in rosy sparks. I sat there, watching the concrete fleck with bits of pink as he gashed the key against the bike's bones. I wanted to cry but did not yet know how to in English. So I did nothing.

That was the day I learned how dangerous a color can be. That a boy could be knocked off that shade and made to reckon his trespass. Even if color is nothing but what the light reveals, that ‚nothing’ has laws, and a boy on a pink bike must learn, above all else, the law of gravity.“

While the novel's non-linear structure and dense prose may be challenging for some readers (including myself), Vuong's ability to convey profound truths through his writing makes it a deeply rewarding read. "On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous" is a poignant and powerful meditation on love, loss, and the beauty and pain of life. It is a book that lingers in the mind long after the last page is turned.

Content Warnings

sofiam19's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Stunning prose, tough read. Really felt the author’s emotions come through his writing.

Content Warnings

katanai's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

this was so, so raw. raw in the way your skin feels after getting sun burnt - hot, with a reassurance that after the initial burn, even the brush of your own clothes is going to make your skin sting for a couple of days because of it's rawness. but, reading this was also like being swept up in a river where everything flows so gently until the current picks up and you remember that you're in a river and you've never really known how to float, but you can swim, but the cold is eating at your skin and how long can you go?

i already mentioned it but vuong's writing is so captivating and raw and there were several lines that made me cry, but the type of crying that builds up without you knowing and then suddenly you're crying silently. i think i've tapped too much, but this was so so raw without it being tryhard.

Content Warnings

tahinisaltsummer's review against another edition

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emotional funny sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

intimate, violently sad, deeply moving. vuong has a wonderful prose, I loved the extended metaphors that structured the text.

Content Warnings

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