[a:Ocean Vuong|4456871|Ocean Vuong|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1561472666p2/4456871.jpg]'s words fill the yawning chasm of the grief felt due to being uprooted, smothering the void with delicate, carefully sculpted words that somehow mask the vicious undercurrent of anguish. Much like the Japanese artform of Kintsugi, Vuong's words meld together the fractured landscape of a war-displaced Vietnamese family, restoring the pieces of an erstwhile happiness, through poetic prose.

[b:On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous|57045282|On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous|Ocean Vuong|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1613198131l/57045282.SX50.jpg|61665003], though essentially a rambling letter in English (in the loosest sense) from Little Dog to his mother (who does not speak the language), is so much more. At its heart, it is a reclamation of life , of embracing new power dynamics in an alien land, of navigating a new 'normal' (though what is normal, really?). Little Dog dances on eggshells around his mother, who speaks almost no English, and struggles to maintain a relationship of respect with her son when they immigrate to the States, their hierarchies being reversed when it is Little Dog, who, with his English, must help his mother find her way about. I stopped several times during my reading of this book to mark sentences, which were ephemerally beautiful, placed just so. His grandmother Lam, a tenuous link to his Vietnamese origins, reminds him of his familial past.

Little Dog's sexuality is an important part of this book, as Vuong details his burgeoning relationship with a white man. This relationship is an uprooting within an uprooting, taking Little Dog further away from his mother than a lack of language ever could. As he struggles to come to terms with his otherness , he finally discloses his sexuality to his mother, in a most mundane setting.

"You want sugar, Ma?" I asked. "What about cream, or actually, maybe a doughnut? Oh no, you like the croissants -"

"Say what you have to say, Little Dog." Your tone subdued, watery. The steam from the cup gave your face a shifting expression.

"I don't like girls."

I didn't want to use the Vietnamese word for it - pê-đê - from the French pédé, short for pédéraste. ... the epithet for criminals"

Eventually, the reader hopes, Little Dog gets through to his Ma, employing his words to give shape to his inner turmoil. Though he does not know the pain of his initial displacement from Vietnam, the repercussions of that move, and the subsequent losses he endures, confer on Little Dog a grave clarity, allowing him to introspect on the different relationships which have helped him survive, even thrive, in Hartford, Connecticut.

The entire story is akin to a Jenga-tower. Not one word out of place, a fragile structure in its temporariness, waiting for a gust of wind to demolish it. This is a bildungsroman quite possibly like no other, and I would definitely recommend it to everyone.