Summary
Winner of the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction! Perfect for fans of Elizabeth Acevedo, Ibi Zoboi, and Erika L. Sánchez, this gorgeously written and deeply moving novel is the YA debut from the award-winning author of Inside Out & Back Again. 4 starred reviews!
In the final days of the Việt Nam War, Hằng takes her little brother, Linh, to the airport, determined to find a way to safety in America. In a split second, Linh is ripped from her arms--and Hằng is left behind in the war-torn country.
Six years later, Hằng has made the brutal journey from Việt Nam and is now in Texas as a refugee. She doesn't know how she will find the little brother who was taken from her until she meets LeeRoy, a city boy with big rodeo dreams, who decides to help her.
Hằng is overjoyed when she reunites with Linh. But when she realizes he doesn't remember her, their family, or Việt Nam, her heart is crushed. Though the distance between them feels greater than ever, Hằng has come so far that she will do anything to bridge the gap.
School Library Journal Review
Gr 9 Up--After the fall of Saigon during the Vietnam War, hundreds of children were airlifted from Vietnam to the United States. Hang saw to it that her three-year-old brother Linh was one of these children, though at the airport she's shocked to discover she's too old to accompany him. Six years later, 18-year-old Hang arrives in Texas, where her uncle and his family live, carrying an address, the only connection she has to her brother. Although her uncle promises that he will take her to the address in Amarillo, she cannot wait. She catches a bus and eventually a ride with LeeRoy, who is headed to Amarillo to meet his rodeo hero. When they arrive, Linh does not remember her and wants nothing to do with her. LeeRoy and Hang get jobs at a neighboring ranch where she tries to connect with her brother and LeeRoy tries to learn how to be a cowboy. Hang and LeeRoy, as well as the other main characters, have complex personalities that often clash. Hang's English dialogue, written in Vietnamese syllables, has to be sounded out by readers and can be difficult to interpret, though it becomes clearer when LeeRoy repeats what she says. The plot has a nice blend of external and internal action although some knowledge of the Vietnam War would make for better understanding of Hang's trauma. VERDICT While this is not Lai's strongest book, the universal truths about the lingering aftermath of war make it one that will find readers.--Janet Hilbun, University of North Texas, Denton
Publisher's Weekly Review
Lai (Listen, Slowly) centers her remarkable YA debut on two 18-year-old protagonists: Ha˘'ng, a determined Vietnamese refugee, and LeeRoy, an aspiring cowboy. Just after her arrival in Texas from Vietnam in 1981, Ha˘'ng sneaks out of her uncle's house to look for her younger brother, who was evacuated by American troops years before. Armed only with an address in Amarillo, she sets off on a bus, and, at a rest stop, collides with hopeful LeeRoy when strangers convince him to drive her, and their lives become further intertwined after they both find work on a ranch near Ha˘'ng's brother's adopted home. In chapters that alternately focus on the protagonists' perspectives, the layered narrative gradually unwinds Ha˘'ng's tremendous guilt about her brother, the trauma of her journey from Vietnam, and the intensity of the pain caused by her brother's indifference. Lai ably sketches the chemistry between Ha˘'ng and LeeRoy; he interprets her English and helps her relate to her brother, she models dedication and loyalty, and the two slowly become friends and more. Told with ample grace, Lai's finely drawn narrative and resilient characters offer a memorable, deeply felt view of the Vietnam War's impact. Ages 13--up. (Sept.)
Horn Book Review
During the 1975 fall of Saigon, twelve-year-old Hang determines that she and her younger brother, Linh, should escape to America. They attempt to impersonate orphans to join Operation Babylift, but the refugee workers reject Hang, taking five-year-old Linh and leaving her behind, with only the address of his destination in Texas. For six years she plans to join him, and, after enduring a harrowing and horrific boat trip (revealed in tense flashbacks), Hang arrives in Texas. She has one goal: to find her brother. Upon arrival she meets rodeo-star wannabe LeeRoy, who grudgingly agrees to take her to Linh, now a thoroughly Americanized boy called David, with no memory of Hang and no interest in reuniting. One strength of the novel is the subtle character development as both LeeRoy and Hang grow naturally from single-issue actors to individuals who recognize and respond to the complexities of both themselves and those around them. Another is Lais use of language. When Hang speaks in English, Lai represents her words phonetically, forcing the reader to become both listener and decipherer, an equally engaged but sometimes frustrated partner in her quest for mai bo-r-do [my brother]. Initially Hangs limited English isolates her, but as she becomes more proficient in the language, she expands her outlook and her circle of friends. As a sympathetic acquaintance says: Shes got a story, thats for sure, and I for one aim to hear it. Those who do hear her remarkable tale can additionally think about contemporary connections to immigrant experiences, feelings of being an outsider, and the detours ones life may take. betty carter September/October 2019 p.92(c) Copyright 2019. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
The day after Hng arrives in Texas from a refugee camp, she heads toward Amarillo to find her little brother.On that same day in 1981, an 18-year-old aspiring cowboy named LeeRoy is traveling to Amarillo to pursue his rodeo dreams. After some helpful meddling from a couple at a rest stop, LeeRoy finds himself driving Hng on her search instead. They make an odd pair, a white boy from Austin and a determined Vietnamese refugee on a mission. But their chemistry works: Hng sees through LeeRoy's cowboy airs, and LeeRoy understands Hng's clever English pronunciations, cobbled together from Vietnamese syllables. When they find Hng's brother and he remembers nothing about Vietnam, Hng and LeeRoy settle in at the ranch next door. Hng's heartbreaking memories of the day her brother was mistakenly taken by Americans at the end of the war, her harrowing journey to America, and the family she left behind are all tempered by LeeRoy's quiet patience and exasperated affection. It is their warm and comic love/hate relationship, developing over the course of the summer into something more, that is the soul of award-winning Lai's (Listen, Slowly, 2015, etc.) first young adult novel. Every sentence is infused with warmth, and Lai shows readers that countless moments of grace exist even in the darkest times.Masterfully conjures grace, beauty, and humor out of the tragic wake of the Vietnam War. (author's note) (Historical fiction. 13-18) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
As she did in the Newbery Honor- and National Book Award-winning Inside Out and Back Again (2011), Lai tells the story of a Vietnamese refugee. Here the girl is 18-year-old Hang, who carries several secrets as she makes the perilous journey to family in Texas. One: in the waning days of the war, Hang handed over her five-year-old brother, Linh, at an airlift. Almost immediately, the 11-year-old realized her plan for both of them to be taken, with her unknowing parents to somehow follow, was stupid. Then her father dies, and her mother and grandmother spend the next six years planning to retrieve Linh. But when Hang does find Linh, now David, he has no desire for a relationship. Simultaneously, the story of LeeRoy is told: a well-to-do kid with dreams of becoming a cowboy, he becomes entangled with Hang and her family, forcing him to look outside his narrow desires. Hang's other secret is brilliantly and painfully disclosed, and throughout, the use of the Vietnamese language enhances the reality. There are a few hiccups in the plot that might pull readers out of the story, but Lai's beautiful storytelling quickly draws them back in. Her imagery awakens the senses, whether describing an earthmover as a parched giraffe made of metal, or depicting the varying sweetness of Vietnamese fruit. Most powerful is the deep throb of regret and the thinnest wisps of hopefulness that Lai conveys throughout. They touch the soul.--Ilene Cooper Copyright 2019 Booklist
