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4.4 AVERAGE
4.4 AVERAGE
Bui details her complex family history, with her parents growing up in times of turmoil, getting married, then leaving Vietnam via boat. It’s interesting how Bui shares her family history asynchronously.
This is a beautifully narrated heartbreaking story of family, trauma, and finding yourself both within and beyond that trauma.
Highly recommend!
This is a beautifully narrated heartbreaking story of family, trauma, and finding yourself both within and beyond that trauma.
Highly recommend!
I love the art style, I love the way the story was structured, and love love love the way she writes. Extremely emotional without being a sob story, ambivalent without being discarding. Made me reflect on my own relationship with my parents.
emotional
informative
sad
fast-paced
hopeful
reflective
sad
fast-paced
Much like Diaz’s The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, reading texts with varied perspectives offers an opportunity to gain the full picture of how we relate, especially seeing the systemic affect of colonialism, foreign policy, and diplomacy.
Some of my favorite quotes:
“I still have the chessboard my father made when I was a kid, and the wooden set of pieces we played with. Revisiting this game of war and strategy, I think about how none of the Vietnamese people in that video have a name or voice. My grandparents, my patents, my sisters, and me— we weren’t any of the pieces on the chessboard” (185).
“The struggle to bring a life into this world is rewarded by that cry. It is a single-minded effort, uncluttered and clear in its objective. What follows afterward— that is, the rest of the child’s life— is another story” (273).
“How much of ME is my own, and how much is stamped into my blood and bone predestined? I used to imagine that history had infused my parents’ lives with the dust of a cataclysmic explosion. That it had seeped through their skin and become part of their blood. That being my father’s child, I, too, was a product of war... and being my mother’s child, could never measure up to her. But maybe being their child simply means that I will always feel the weight of their past. Nothing that happened makes me special. But my life is a gift that is too great— a debt I can never repay” (325).
Some of my favorite quotes:
“I still have the chessboard my father made when I was a kid, and the wooden set of pieces we played with. Revisiting this game of war and strategy, I think about how none of the Vietnamese people in that video have a name or voice. My grandparents, my patents, my sisters, and me— we weren’t any of the pieces on the chessboard” (185).
“The struggle to bring a life into this world is rewarded by that cry. It is a single-minded effort, uncluttered and clear in its objective. What follows afterward— that is, the rest of the child’s life— is another story” (273).
“How much of ME is my own, and how much is stamped into my blood and bone predestined? I used to imagine that history had infused my parents’ lives with the dust of a cataclysmic explosion. That it had seeped through their skin and become part of their blood. That being my father’s child, I, too, was a product of war... and being my mother’s child, could never measure up to her. But maybe being their child simply means that I will always feel the weight of their past. Nothing that happened makes me special. But my life is a gift that is too great— a debt I can never repay” (325).
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
fast-paced
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
dark
emotional
informative
medium-paced
Beautiful and moving account of some of Vietnam's 'boat people' and their integration into American life. This graphic novel is not only beautifully presented but it also frames Vietnam's turbulent history through a mixture of oral histories. These tales have cast a new light on the conflict for me.