I already wanted to read this one for a prompt for the Genre Challenge on @the.storygraph, and then it was announced as July’s @thestackspod book club pick so I grabbed myself a copy sooner rather than later!
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This graphic memoir begins with the author giving birth to her own child. This causes her to reflect back on her (often fraught) relationship with her own parents. From there, she tells us their story of growing up in a politically turbulent Vietnam, how they met, and the beginnings of their family. Thi Bui was born just at the end of the Vietnam War, and the family fled Vietnam in 1978, landing first in a refugee camp in Malaysia before moving on to the US to live with family.
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I loved how vulnerable the author got with her audience. She admitted that her parents were not perfect parents (does such a thing even exist?), but their histories explained a lot, especially her father. He grew up amid a lot of hardship and horror, which left a terrified young boy to grow up and hide behind a stoic façade.
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The author’s relationship with her mother is also complex. I liked what she says about the selfishness of being someone’s child and the difficulty of recognising your parents as people in their own right, not just your parents. She goes on to wonder whether her own experiences will invariably affect her own son in ways she can’t control or limit.
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The artwork is stunning, I loved the colour palette and the broad, sweeping-ness of it. The author has a knack for depicting emotion in simple yet resonant ways.