Owner of a Lonely Heart

A Memoir

De: Beth Nguyen

Narrado por: Beth Nguyen

Duración: 5 h y 27 m

Resumen del Editor

Named a Best Memoir of 2023 by Oprah Daily • Selected by Time, NPR, and BookPage as a Best Book of 2023

“This book…is what memoir writing in the hands of a caring, curious wunderkind can be.” —Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy

From the award-winning author of Stealing Buddha’s Dinner, a powerful memoir of a mother-daughter relationship fractured by war and resettlement.

At the end of the Vietnam War, when Beth Nguyen was eight months old, she and her family fled Saigon for America. Only Beth’s mother stayed—or was left—behind, and they did not meet again until Beth was nineteen. Over the course of her adult life, she and her mother have spent less than twenty-four hours together.

Owner of a Lonely Heart is “a portrait of things left unsaid” (The New York Times), a memoir about parenthood, absence, and the condition of being a refugee: the story of Beth’s relationship with her mother. Framed by a handful of visits over the course of many years—sometimes brief, sometimes interrupted, some alone with her mother and others with the company of her sister—Beth tells an “unforgettable” (People) coming-of-age story that spans her childhood in the Midwest, her first meeting with her mother, and her own experience of parenthood.

©2023 Beth Nguyen (P)2023 Simon & Schuster Audio

Perspective

This is a beautifully written book, mind expanding book. Its perspective makes you think. I have tremendous respect for the author.

Trauma of war

Memoires of regular citizens with a story to recount is a fascinating genre. I found it very, very interesting especially since I have visited Vietnam recently and I am a mother of 3. I have recommended it to many and am asking my family to read it because we all traveled to Vietnam together. To hear a Vietnamese refugee’s side of the story was very interesting. Highly recommend it.

Hard listen

It’s so difficult to listen to her staccato delivery. I found myself just not caring about her life story, which is not what I was hoping for when I purchased the book. After trying over and over to get into the story, I’ve given up.

Disappointing

I was looking forward to this memoir after reading Stealing Buddha's dinner last year, which I thoroughly enjoyed. However, after Nguyen declared that her white boyfriend's mother's gift to her of a canvas bag with Nguyen's initials embroidered on it was an act of assimilation, I could not continue listening. It was not the first remark of this nature. It seems a lot of the internalized racism, and even blatant racism she experienced is being projected onto the actions of people who were kind and welcoming to Nguyen.