Publisher Description

You can go home again. When twenty-three-year-old Maia Trieu, a curator's assistant at the Museum of Folklore & Rocks in Little Saigon, Orange County, is offered a research grant to Vietnam for the summer of 1991, she cannot refuse. The grant's sponsor has one stipulation: Maia is to contact her great-aunt to pass on plans to overthrow the current government. The expatriates did not anticipate that Maia would become involved with excursions in search of her mother or attract an entourage: an American traveler, a government agent, an Amerasian singer, and a cat. Maia carries out what she believes is her role as a filial daughter to her late father, a former ARVN soldier, by returning to their homeland to continue the fight for an independent Vietnam. Along the way, however, she meets a cast of characters--historical and fictional, living and dead--who propel her on a journey of self-discovery, through which she begins to understand what it means to love.

Author Biography

Thuy Da Lam was born in Qui Nhn, grew up in Philadelphia, and now lives in Honolulu, where she works on her next book and teaches at Kapi'olani Community College. She holds a BA in creative writing from Hamilton College and PhD in English from UH Mnoa. She received the George A. Watrous Literary Prize for Fiction, Myrtle Clark Writing Award, and John Young Scholarship in the Arts. Her debut novel, Fire Summer, is a revision of her dissertation, part of which appeared in Lost Lake Folk Opera in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Da Lam was born in Qui Nhn, grew up in Philadelphia, and now lives in Honolulu, where she works on her next book and teaches at Kapi'olani Community College. She holds a BA in creative writing from Hamilton College and PhD in English from UH Mnoa. She received the George A. Watrous Literary Prize for Fiction, Myrtle Clark Writing Award, and John Young Scholarship in the Arts. Her debut novel, Fire Summer, is a revision of her dissertation, part of which appeared in Lost Lake Folk Opera in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Da Lam was born in Qui Nhn, grew up in Philadelphia, and now lives in Honolulu, where she works on her next book and teaches at Kapi'olani Community College. She holds a BA in creative writing from Hamilton College and PhD in English from UH Mnoa. She received the George A. Watrous Literary Prize for Fiction, Myrtle Clark Writing Award, and John Young Scholarship in the Arts. Her debut novel, Fire Summer, is a revision of her dissertation, part of which appeared in Lost Lake Folk Opera in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Da Lam was born in Qui Nhn, grew up in Philadelphia, and now lives in Honolulu, where she works on her next book and teaches at Kapi'olani Community College. She holds a BA in creative writing from Hamilton College and PhD in English from UH Mnoa. She received the George A. Watrous Literary Prize for Fiction, Myrtle Clark Writing Award, and John Young Scholarship in the Arts. Her debut novel, Fire Summer, is a revision of her dissertation, part of which appeared in Lost Lake Folk Opera in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War./

Review

Lam's novel is a whimsical, if elegiac, perception-altering hero's journey inspired by mourning and displacement, in which the dead roam throughout the country and former and would-be soldiers hide out in Cambodian borderlands. In Fire Summer, truth and art coexist, while imagination never quite overpowers experience.
—Diacritic
Like a strip of curtain between the dead and the living, Fire Summer is at once ephemeral and expansive. A haunting debut from a writer whose characters, lovingly described, pass not only through rivers and airports, but also despair and separation. We are ferried with them to the other side—one where the fractured are finally come home.
—Uzma Aslam Khan, author of Trespassing and Thinner Than SkinFire Summer delivers a war-ravaged Vietnam rich in history, folklore, the tragedy of families torn asunder, and the beauty of Buddhist wisdom that connects the living and dead. Suspenseful, Thuy Da Lam's story of Maia Trieu's journey home is an impressive debut.
— Charles Johnson, author of Middle Passage"What is the shape of one's life when one's action is based on love?" So asks a character in Thuy Da Lam's lyrical novel, Fire Summer, a work that shows us the Vietnam beyond the war movies. Lam deftly explores the slippery interplay between heritage and identity, history and duty, ultimately proving that each of us is so much more than the places we come from. An important debut.
— Quan Barry, author of She Weeps Each Time You're BornIn Fire Summer, past and present blend with here and there in ways that continually surprise, yet somehow seem destined. Vietnam is the setting and the legacy for the returning expatriate Maia, and for an entourage of vivid characters who encounter and reencounter each other as they travel from the shores to the mountains, searching for family, closure, and a home. A beautiful, funny, and stunning novel that will reward repeated reading.
—Craig Howes, author of Voices of the Vietnam POWs: Witnesses to Their FightA girl plucked from the high seas off Vietnam is sent as a young woman to connect with an aging guerilla faction. A detective story, a quest for the mythic heart of Vietnam on its stones and soil—a novel of rare beauty.
—Robert Onopa, author of The Pleasure Tube

Review Quote

"'What is the shape of one's life when one's action is based on love?' So asks a character in Thuy Da Lam's lyrical novel, Fire Summer, a work that shows us the Vietnam beyond the war movies. Lam deftly explores the slippery interplay between heritage and identity, history and duty, ultimately proving that each of us is so much more than the places we come from. An important debut." --Quan Barry, author of She Weeps Each Time You're Born

Feature

DEBUT NOVEL-- Thuy Da Lam's first published novel. ORIGINALLY A DISSERTATION-- Fire Summer is a revision of Thuy Da Lam's dissertation, part of which appeared in Lost Lake Folk Opera in commemoration of the fortieth anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. AUTHOR BACKGROUND-- Thuy Da Lam was born in Qui Nhn, grew up in Philadelphia, and now lives in Honolulu, where she works on her next book and teaches at Kapi'olani Community College. AWARDS--She received the George A. Watrous Literary Prize for Fiction, a Myrle Clark Writing Award, and the John Young Scholarship in the Arts. BASED OFF OF EVENTS FROM VIETNAM WAR-- A must read for fans of fictional literature inspired by war.

Excerpt from Book

Excerpt One She was free at last. She gripped the railing of the now-abandoned fishing boat, its plank deck heaving beneath her feet. In the noon light, the distant island seemed to bob like a mossy green canteen on its side. The captain and navigator, an old fisherman from a southeastern seaport of Vietnam they had escaped from a week before, had plunged in first. Others followed. The shoal of their black heads dipped and rose in the waves as the pouches and satchels strapped to their gaunt, sunburnt backs dispersed. A flock of seagulls circled and lit upon the crests to pick at the feast afloat on the South China Sea. The woman looped the handles of her red basket around her shoulder. She was glad her few possessions were in tightly sealed jars and plastic bags. When she hoisted her leg onto the railing, she noticed someone had scratched the date on the wood. Bidon 12-18-1980. She slowly raised herself and pulled up her other leg. She crouched there, feeling the pitch and wallow of the boat. As her body moved, she balanced and stood up. White sand encircled the hilly island like a strand of luminous, odd-shaped pearls. Farther inland, thatched-roof huts nestled beneath coconut palms that bowed toward the sea. She breathed in deeply, clasped her hands, and gazed into the water. She felt suddenly light. She dove into a reflected sky. As she submerged, the woman arched her back and lifted her head skyward to surface but slipped back instead. The ocean coursed through her body and pulled her down. The murmur of the sea lullabied her. She relaxed her grip, and the straps of her basket rose from her shoulder, scattering pictures of a husband on a bridge that hung across a river like a crescent moon and a daughter named after a blossom of the Lunar New Year. The ocean tugged at the woman's fingers and spread her arms. She soared through the clear blue sky. Excerpt Two While Saigon slept at noon, Maia Trieu returned with her father's ashes. Her flight on the Boeing 707 from Los Angeles with a changeover in Bangkok bore citizens of free nations. As she deplaned and bussed across the tarmac of Tan Son Nhat International Airport, she was caught in the intertwinement of yellow rice paddies and abandoned bunkered hangars, fusing in the summer heat of 1991. Across the aisle, a man murmured about the humidity and wiped the sweat from his face with the back of his hand. When he pushed his dark hair off his forehead, she saw gray-green eyes, and her hand reflexively reached for the jade locket around her neck. The jade's muted color did not spark like the man's eyes, but the locket felt large and important on her. She gazed out at the midday mirage. Sunrays flickered on the hot asphalt runways and glimmered off wet rice paddies. Thirteen years earlier, she had escaped the country with her father, crossing the South China Sea in an overcrowded fishing boat to find asylum in America. Her hand clasped the octangular jade locket. Ba, we're home. "That's a shame," the man said, looking past her through the window at the bunkered hangars. "A terrible shame." He peered through his camera and snapped several pictures. Besides a few Asian businessmen, the visitors were mostly Europeans, some from the newly unified Germany. The gray-eyed man of mixed ancestry was traveling alone. He looked at her. "Viet kieu?" he asked. His voice had a distinct American intonation. Except for a lightning bolt tattoo on his upper left arm, he fit the profile of an innocuous tourist. Beneath his relaxed exterior, she detected something else. The trolley stopped at the terminal, and attendants in light azure

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