Things We Lost to the Water

‘The sun was rising. They were facing east. The water, she realized, wasn’t that bad. The waves, you got used to them. With time.’

I am incredibly surprised how underrated this is compared to Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. Vuong’s novel has over 170k ratings, whereas this novel has a meager amount of 8k ratings. That is not to diminish either—the former didn’t work for me and this one did, but another reader may have a completely different experience; both novels are important testaments to the Vietnamese-American experience, and valuable as such. Nguyen’s prose is perhaps simpler and more standard, but it nevertheless manages to pack quite the emotional punch I was first looking for in Vuong’s novel. I was so immersed in the story that I stayed up past dawn to finish reading it (from the mid-point, not the beginning), which itself is evidence as to how much I enjoyed this book. This is a remarkable novel that has helped me understand and emotionally connect with the Vietnam War and the experiences of Vietnamese-Americans who are marked by this event, whether personally or intergenerationally (not sure that is a word, but too bad).The setting for the book takes you from late-1970s Saigon in Vietnam to New Orleans in the US. We are following Hương and her two sons who flee Communist-controlled Vietnam in the hopes of a freer and better life for themselves—except, for reasons unknown to Hương (and to the reader, to a degree), the father does not manage to follow. Nguyen deftly portrays the experience of a single woman, a young woman of 25 years at the time she flees her homeland, and how she deals with finding herself in her new home, acclimating to a new culture, and raising two boys. The demands force her to mature and become responsible for much in a short amount of time. It felt quite personal in the way that Vuong’s novel did, but within the clear limitations of fiction—Nguyen obviously isn’t a single mother fleeing Vietnam, but his ability to write through the eyes of one is impeccable. It was fascinating reading about both a decade and a location I am quite unfamiliar with; so unfamiliar, in fact, that the climactic event towards the end of the novel took me by surprise, despite occurring in my lifetime. (Honestly, I felt dumb for not seeing it coming.)The characters are multifaceted and dynamic. Though the narrative gives us snippets of each character’s perspective in certain years, the narrative does not feel like it has too many gaps. Sure, it would be nice to spend more time in each character’s head, but this is a flaw of novels with multiple POVs, and not necessarily of this novel itself. Despite the switch in perspectives, the progression felt natural and flowed well. I found myself relating to almost all of the characters in different ways, though Hương was by far my favorite—her coming into herself as an American immigrant and confident in herself was beautiful. Tuấn and Bình/Ben, her sons, were also cleverly written characters. I agree with many others that some of Ben’s actions felt irrational and detestable, but that only furthered the realism of the book—human beings aren’t predictable, and our lives are messy. We often make bad choices or try to make the best of a bad situation. Ben was the exemplar of that, and his struggle to discover himself through various lenses was quite compelling; it also helped that a lot of his feelings about being ‘abroad’ and crafting a new identity for himself, as well as his overall motivation, echo my own experience at the moment. Tuấn’s perspective did seem a bit short in the novel, but you still get a sense of a character arc from him, which I appreciated. It was interesting seeing the ways in which the family reflected my own—and in that sense, I related a lot to Ben, being the younger sibling growing up fully in the adopted homeland.For a debut novel, it is quite an ambitious one, but by narrowing the focus to a single family in a particular moment, Nguyen is able to hone in on the accompanying emotions and themes that define such a narrative. Among these, the theme of identity struck me a lot while reading, as well as the concern of what we owe to our family. Each character struggles with identity, whether not fitting in with broader society or in the family unit, and the characters have a tumultuous relationship with each other. Yet the narrative emphasizes that they are still a family—and the conclusion of the novel demonstrates that well. Another important theme is displacement, and what it means to have ties to a particular land (or water). I pondered the meaning of the title, and it is a clever one, but it took me nearly towards the end to begin putting the pieces of meaning together. (That is my own shortcoming, not the novel’s.) Most importantly, the novel is an important reflection on the experience of many real Vietnamese refugees who were displaced by the war and forced to carve out an immigrant’s existence in unknown and reluctant homelands—and in spite of which, they nonetheless thrived. Especially in the current political situation, this kind of story is much needed.There are definitely some parts that fall short, but that is to be expected when a novel has to keep up with so many moving parts. Some minor details felt out-of-place or shoddy (e.g. was France already using euros in 2000? I think not; was it commonplace for a working class person to have a cellphone in 1999?). The father’s age and some timeline details didn’t quite seem logical (was he just 17 when the first child was born?). Ben’s relationship with the high school graduate felt a bit awkward and like it should have felt more meaningful than it did; Tuấn’s final relationship with a certain someone also felt a bit weird given their history, though not improbable. Aside from relationships, the end of the novel feels more like an abrupt lurch than a satisfying conclusion, but we’ve already seen that this novel doesn’t follow every norm of a standard narrative. The impetus for the novel is partly the the author’s own search for identity, which is perhaps why it is so evocative. Though a work of fiction, Nguyen nevertheless is skillful in making an impressionable and touching work that will leave the reader contemplative and inspired.Favorite quotes:○ ‘Forgetting, she was so sure, was easy, the easiest thing that could be done; we forget all the time—we forget names and addresses, the color a childhood dress, the name of a favorite song. We could forget anything and everything, if only we tried, if only we made the effort.’○ ‘If war had taught her one thing, it was that ideology—how you believed the world should be, what you would die to uphold—was always flawed, and though innocent on its own, it could lead to tragedy.’○ ‘His immigration to Paris was a story made of flesh and bones written by himself, and no matter how horrible things turned out, he was the one who wrote it. That was the important part—to be the writer of his own story.’