by Cecile Pin
First published 2023
In 1975, three Vietnamese children escape Saigon's final chaotic days, leaving their parents behind. Toan, twelve years old, becomes guardian to his younger siblings Anh and Minh after their parents vanish during the war's collapse. Navigating refugee camps in Hong Kong and eventual resettlement in London, the siblings confront profound loss and the fragmented memory of their family. Each struggles to adapt: Toan shoulders impossible responsibilities, Anh seeks connection in a strange new world, and Minh wrestles with the phantom of their interrupted childhood. Their survival depends not just on practical endurance, but on maintaining the delicate threads of their shared history. As years pass, they must decide whether memory will destroy them or serve as a bridge to healing.
Genres: literary-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, war, 21st-century, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, survival
Setting: Saigon, Hong Kong, London
Period: 1975
256 pages · Kindle Edition · Fourth Estate
Content warnings: war