This book was lovingly written. It is poetic and gentle in its illuminations of deeply hurting characters. Despite their flaws, they are described with care and affection by a narrator who simply wants to understand them. This book deals with themes like the immigrant experience in the United States, growing LGBTQ in an environment at the least unwelcoming to it and at worst hostile, and with drug use and abuse in the age of fentanyl. Vuong takes tragic emotional material and makes something beautiful out of it. Well worth a read.