Where the ashes are
Subtitle: the odyssey of a Vietnamese family
By: Nguyẽ̂n Quí Đức.
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
Published: 2009
Place of publication: Lincoln [Neb.]
Language: eng
Number of pages: 265
ISBN-13: 9780803226982
Subjects: Nguyẽ̂n, Quí Đức; Vietnam War, 1961-1975 -- Personal narratives, Vietnamese; Political refugees -- Vietnam; Vietnam -- History -- 1975-
Genres: Personal narratives, Vietnamese
Description: In 1968 Nguyen Qui Duc was nine years old, his father was a high-ranking civil servant in the South Vietnamese government, and his mother was a school principal. Then the Viet Cong launched their Tet offensive, and the Nguyen family's comfortable life was destroyed. The authors father was taken prisoner, he eventually spent twelve years in captivity. Nguyen himself escaped from Saigon as North Vietnamese tanks approached in 1975. He came of age as an American teenager. The author's mother stayed in Vietnam to look after her mentally ill daughter. She endured poverty and reeducation until her husband was freed and the Nguyens could reunite. Intertwining these three stories, Where the Ashes Are shows us the Vietnam War through a child's eyes, privation after a Communist takeover, and the struggle of new immigrants. The author, who returned to Vietnam as an American reporter, provides a detailed portrait of the nation as it opened to the West in the early 1990s. Where the Ashes Are closes with Nguyen's thoughts on being pulled between his adopted country and his homeland.
Notes: Originally published:  Reading, Mass :  Addison-Wesley Pub., c1994.
Table of contents: title: A note on Vietnamese names; title: The year of the monkey; title: You're like your father now; title: The Ho Chi Minh trail; title: Leaving home; title: Authentic hue beef noodle; title: Where there is everything; title: They don't sit around in cafés here, do they?; title: Nothing is more precious than independence and liberty; title: La fin d'un cauchemar; title: Among the huddled masses; title: Land of freedom; title: Fat man's come home.