Listen, Slowly by T. Lai

Abstract

Lai, Thanhha. Listen, Slowly. New York: HarperCollins Children’s Books, 2015. Print.

Twelve year-old Mai wants nothing more for her summer vacation than to spend her days on the beach hanging out with her best friend, getting to know her first romantic crush. Instead, her parents expect Mai to chaperone her grandmother (Bà) on a return trip to Vietnam to uncover the secrets of her grandfather’s disappearance and death in “THE WAR” over 40 years ago. Despite being raised in a home that carried on some Vietnamese traditions, Mai’s parents could not have prepared her for the heat, mosquitoes or infrequent Internet access in her grandfather’s rural northern village. In a display of her preteen angst, Mai immediately starts counting down the days until she can return to the known comforts of life back home in California.

With time, however, her language skills improve and she begins to form relationships in the community, particularly with Ut, a girl her age with a serious interest in frogs, and Minh, the local teenage translator with a Texan drawl he acquired through his international studies in the United States. In Mai’s ensuing journey she travels across Vietnam, from the rural rhythms of her ancestral village to the colonial splendour of Hanoi and the humid chaos of Ho Chi Minh City. The nation’s contrasts provide her with an unforgettable summer that far surpasses anything she could have imagined with her initial Laguna Beach plans.

After receiving a 2011 National Book Award and 2012 Newbery Medal Honor for Inside Out and Back Again, Thanhha Lai’s second novel continues to explore Vietnamese-American experiences. In contrast to her first book’s focus on a refugee family’s journey, Listen, Slowly examines the frustrations of a second-generation American attempting to reconcile her Vietnamese cultural deficits. Mai’s path to settle within her bicultural identity is an experience familiar to thousands of children her age, who are raised in part with traditions from their parents’ country yet never fully feel immersed in that culture. In her protagonist, Lai has created a relatable character who eventually, and maybe reluctantly, shows capacity for adaptation and resilience in the face of adversity.

Lai depicts a vibrant Vietnam with verdant landscapes and mouth-watering descriptions of the nation’s notoriously fresh cuisine. The novel’s humour generally hits the mark, including a hilarious passage of cultural colonialism in which Mai convinces young Vietnamese girls to transform their comfortable underwear to thongs. While the disruption of the story’s pace during philosophical Vietnamese translations might test the patience of young readers, this challenge will be welcomed by many. Overall, this story of adventure, family history and bicultural identity is one that should have a home in all school and public libraries.

Recommended: 3 out of 4 Stars
Reviewer: Kyle Marshall

Kyle Marshall is the School-Aged Services Intern Librarian for Edmonton Public Library. He graduated with his MLIS from the University of Alberta in June 2015, and is passionate about diversity in children's and youth literature.