Book Description
Kien Nguyen grew up an outsider in his native land. His once prosperous family, thrust into poverty at the dawn of a new political regime, lived among neighbors who treated them as an unwelcome remnant of the colonialist past. Kien himself, a child of mixed race (his father was American), was among the most unwanted.Told with a stark, poetic brilliance, Kiens account of his early yearsfrom the fall of Saigon, when at age eight he watched the last U.S. Army helicopter leave without him and his family, to his eventual escapeis a work of profound emotional resonance, at once harrowing and inspiring. The Unwanted unforgettably records a universal human experience played out in extreme circumstances: the forging of an identity, a life.
Customer Reviews:
Hard to put down............2007-10-11
This story was fantastic...It was hard to stop reading. Both my husband and I read the book while on vacation and really enjoyed.
Kien Nguyen does a wonderful job telling his life. I would love a sequel...to know the how his life was after arriving in the U.S.
Gone With The Wind for the Vietnam Conflict.......2007-07-16
Book Review by John J. Fitzgerald
The Unwanted: A Memoir
Kien Nguyen
New York and Boston: Little Brown, 2001
This is a compelling read. It held my attention and I finished it in two readings. Perhaps, because I am a Vietnam veteran, the book's theme held my attention. What happens to the people that we leave behind after an American invasion is repulsed and eventually comes to an end? Many of those who worked with and for the Americans will be viewed as collaborators. French women who dated German soldiers in Paris during WW2 were regarded as trash. What happens to the children of these women and their "foreign affairs", after the invader departs or flees? There have been a lot of these American invasions over the last century or so, and the story told here probably echoes in other lands. In a few years, we will probably get a similar tale based on Iraq.
Kien Nguyen seems to have written an honest tale. Parts of it do not ring true. Not all of the Communist officials are corrupt. Some of the corrupt officials in his tale are actually placed on trial by other Communist officials. He seems to have a very puritanical view of sexual relations and some of his sex scenes are quite sadistic. He does not treat a loving, young, girl friend very well. In fact the "hero," our narrator, is quite self-centered and depicts himself as the innocent victim of all of the activity swirling around him. He seems to dislike, if not hate, his mentally challenged sister. There are some scenes of torture that strain credibility, unless you buy the notion that the Vietnamese people are generally cruel. He has a scene where his cousins kick a dog to death. This strikes me as strange when they could have killed and cooked the animal. Captured "boat people" are first rescued and then "tortured" for no clear reason.
Escape from Hell, Vietnam, is the main goal of the story. The United States is described as the Heavenly City where all truth, goodness and beauty are thought to reside. It is also "air conditioned." The story is heavily shaped by ideology. Americans are good and Vietnamese are not good, for the most part.
The theme of the "Wizard of Oz" is part of this story. If Dorothy can just get to the Emerald City everything will be all right. Kien is our Vietnamese Dorothy.
He can't be happy, or even half happy, living in Vietnam. His real home is America! Dorothy would have settled for Kansas!
I read this book as the product of a South Vietnamese, Republic of Vietnam, "take" on the events of the Vietnam War. The narrator's family members were collaborationists and were quite well off and during their reign of power they treated their countrymen as simply their servants and their inferiors. The one strong character in the tale is the grand-father, and in the best Confucian tradition he is always wise and judicious. He was an officer in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) and it was one of the most corrupt armies the world has ever seen. But he was a hero. (The narrator does not dwell on that fact of life.)
At times, I found myself thinking of Scarlet O'Hara in "Gone With The Wind." Fighting to maintain her ante-bellum lifestyle in a post Civil War Georgia, Scarlet feels no responsibility for slavery. She struggles to hold on to a world that no longer exists. Kien's mother is a lot like Scarlet and so is Kien. Narcissistic and egotistical, they have no sense of obligation to society and act surprised that the society that they reject, rejects them.
Aristocrats after the French Revolution of 1789 acted the same way. They hated the new regime and dreamed of the golden days of the "Ancien Regime."
At times the book seems a bit surreal. But then, the world of Kien is not quite real. He is a half-breed, part Caucasian-American and part Vietnamese. His identity is not anchored in either culture. Some of his narration reveals this when he prays to Buddha and then to God. His words contain some American slang and you have to wonder where he learned it. Was it from his mother?
The book seems to contain a measure of truth. The treatment of the children born of American fathers and Vietnamese women was not kind or humane. Children of colored Americans and Vietnamese women are treated the worst of all. Women get the worse treatment of all. Vietnam is a very sexist society.
The fact that the Vietnamese government allows Kien and his family to leave is not explained. It happens "out of the blue." (There is not much history in this memoir. During the period of the memoir, the big issue in the USA was where are our MIA's and our POW's? Sylvester Stallone was making his fantasy films about the war. The U.S. kept an embargo in place against Vietnam until the 1990's. The Vietnamese never received any of the promised compensation that Nixon/Kissinger promised in their peace treaty of 1973.) Nor is there any serious mention of the damage done to the country and the people of Vietnam by the American war effort. After the American Revolution, those who sided with the British, the "Tories" were regarded as traitors and many of them fled from the states back to England. They were not wanted by their neighbors. These were some of the original "boat people" of American history.
This book might do some harm. It contributes to the notion that the Americans (who invaded Vietnam) were the ones who suffered the most from the Vietnam War. It seems to support the Ronald Reagan claim that the war was a "Noble Cause." In American history, if you believe that the Confederate South's fight against the Union Army was a "Noble Cause," you will probably never get to a clear understanding of the American Civil War. There are some people who do not want us to come to a clear understanding of either the American Civil War or the War in Vietnam. They prefer that we endorse myth over history.
This memoir/book reads too much like a novel to be a significant contribution to history. I predict that it will soon be a Hollywood movie. Right up there with, "Gone With The Wind." It will make the same kind of lasting "contribution" to our understanding of the American past.
-----
See below for an idea of what Ronald Reagan considered the history of the Vietnam War to be.
Source: http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1982/21882b.htm
Public Papers of Ronald Reagan
February 1982
The President's News Conference
February 18, 1982
- - - - - -opening statement- - - - - -
And now, Jim [Jim Gerstenzang, Associated Press], I can't think of anything else to say, so you can ask the first question.
El Salvador
Q. Thank you.
Mr. President, the Secretary of State has said that the United States will do whatever is necessary to head off a guerrilla victory in El Salvador and that the mood of the American people should not necessarily determine our course there. Do you agree with those statements, and under what conditions would you send combat troops to El Salvador?
The President. Well, once again, Jim, we get into an area -- there are all kinds of options -- economic, political, security, and so forth -- that can be used in situations of this kind. And as I've said so often, I just don't believe that you discuss those options or what you may or may not do in advance of doing any of those things -- except that I will say, lest there be some misunderstanding, there are no plans to send American combat troops into action anyplace in the world.
Q. If I could follow that up. Can you just envision any circumstances under which we would be sending U.S. combat troops to El Salvador?
The President. Well, maybe if they dropped a bomb on the White House, I might get mad.
- - - - - - other questions - - - - -
Lou [Lou Cannon, Washington Post]?
Nicaragua
Q. Mr. President, have you approved of covert activity to destabilize the present Government of Nicaragua?
The President. Well, no, we're supporting them. Oh, wait a minute, wait a minute. I'm sorry. I was thinking El Salvador, because of the previous -- when you said that. Nicaragua. Here again, this is something upon which the national security interest -- I will not comment.
But let me say something about all of Central America right now, and questions on that subject. Next week I will be addressing the Organization of American States on that entire subject, and therefore, I'll save any answers to any questions on that subject.
Q. If I could follow up, do you approve or reject -- or do you care to state what your policy is as far as having American covert operations to destabilize any existing government without specific reference to Nicaragua?
The President. No, again I'm going to say this is like discussing the options. No comment on this.
Yes, George [George Skelton, Los Angeles Times].
El Salvador
Q. Mr. President, although you have no plans to send combat troops to El Salvador, plans can be developed quickly. I'd like to hear some expression of your commitment, if there is one, not to use American combat forces in El Salvador. And, again, just how far will your administration go to keep the Duarte government from falling?
The President. Well, George, your question again gets to that thing that I have always said I think has been wrong in the past, when our government has done it -- and I will not do it -- and that is to put down specific do's and don't's [sic] with regard to some situation that deals with not only security matters but even such things as trying to influence a situation such as the one in Poland. I think that to do so is just giving away things that reduce your leverage.
- - - - - - - - other questions - - - - - -
Now, Lesley [Lesley Stahl, CBS News], you were -- --
U.S. Foreign Covert Operations
Q. Thank you, Mr. President. I'm sorry, but I'd like to go back to Latin America and El Salvador for a minute.
In the 1960's the CIA came up with a secret plan to get us involved in Vietnam in a surreptitious, covert manner. Is it possible that you can tell us that there is no secret plan now devised by the CIA or any other agency in government to surreptitiously involve Americans in similar activities in Latin America? And can you also assure the American people that we will not go in there secretly without you and this Government giving us some pre-warning?
The President. Well, Lesley, you know there's a law by which things of this kind have to be cleared with congressional committees before anything is done.
But again, if I may point to something -- I'm not in total agreement with the premise about Vietnam. If I recall correctly, when France gave up Indochina as a colony, the leading nations of the world met in Geneva with regard to helping those colonies become independent nations. And since North and South Vietnam had been, previous to colonization, two separate countries, provisions were made that these two countries could, by a vote of all their people together, decide whether they wanted to be one country or not.
And there wasn't anything surreptitious about it, that when Ho Chi Minh refused to participate in such an election -- and there was provision that people of both countries could cross the border and live in the other country if they wanted to. And when they began leaving by the thousands and thousands from North Vietnam to live in South Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh closed the border and again violated that part of the agreement.
And openly, our country sent military advisers there to help a country which had been a colony have such things as a national security force, an army, you might say, or a military to defend itself. And they were doing this, if I recall correctly, also in civilian clothes, no weapons, until they began being blown up where they lived and walking down the street by people riding by on bicycles and throwing pipe-bombs at them. And then they were permitted to carry sidearms or wear uniforms.
But it was totally a program until John F. Kennedy -- when these attacks and forays became so great that John F. Kennedy authorized the sending in of a division of Marines. And that was the first move toward combat troops in Vietnam.
So, I don't think there's any parallel there between covert activities or anything -- --
Q. Will you tell me that there will not be secret plan that you will not tell the American people about?
The President. I can't answer your question for the same reason that I couldn't answer George's. I just can't answer on that.
There's a lady in the very back row.
- - - - - - - other questions - - - - -
And so it goes!
Excellent! Very Well Written.......2007-06-25
I could not put this book down. It was that good! Every chapter was so vivid and intense.
evocative.......2007-06-09
This book is a distressing and fascinating story and also one of courage. In clear language devoid of bitterness the author tells of the years following the Vietnam War. Both insightful and inspiring.
A wanted reading.......2007-04-04
It's amazing that one person can go through such repeated tragedies in one lifetime. I hope Kien writes a follow up book to document his new life in the United States.
Book Description
How did Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic become the newest members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? Based on interviews conducted with more than 75 individuals--from Cabinet officials to desk officers--James M. Goldgeier tells the inside story of this controversial Clinton administration initiative. Analyzing the earliest internal deliberations, as well as administration discussions with allies, the Russians, and the United States Senate, Goldgeier demonstrates how a handful of committed policymakers outmaneuvered overwhelming bureaucratic opposition. He shows the role of domestic politics in shaping the evolution of this policy and dissects the national campaign waged by the administration's specially created NATO enlargement ratification office and its outside supporters.
Weaving together insights about bureaucratic politics, policy entrepreneurship, and domestic politics, this book provides fresh insights into the American foreign policymaking process.
Customer Reviews:
The definitive history of the US decision to enlarge NATO.......2000-03-22
Professor Goldgeier has completed an exhaustively researched documentary of how US policy evolved from the indifference of the Bush Administration to the eventual activism of the Clinton Administration in bringing in former Warsaw Pact satellite nations of the USSR into the bedrock of Western security, NATO. It is a fascinating and eminently readable account of both Washington policmaking and Alliance politics. Together with former Congressman Gerald B. Solomon's The NATO Enlargement Debate 1990-1997 (Praeger 1998), Professor Goldgeier's volume will certainly satisfy the key curriculum reading list for scholars of European security. A must read. John Borawski Director of the Political Committee NATO Parliamentary Assembly 1987-1999
Book Description
The definitive book on China's uneasy transformation into an economic and political superpower by two Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporters. An insightful and thought-provoking analysis of daily life in China, China Wakes is an exemplary work of reportage. 16 pages of photos.
Customer Reviews:
Vibrant, informative look at China.......2007-08-09
Authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl Wudunn present an interesting look at the world's most populous nation. Readers learn much about the fascinating "Middle Kingdom," its ageless culture and its vibrant people. This book was published in 1994, by which time Deng Xiaoping's market reforms had brought rapid growth and a significantly higher standard of living. But as the authors show, China has its share of abuses, suffering and corruption, and it remains a police state that clamped down in Tiananmen Square. Arguably the world's most advanced nation prior to 1500, China shrank from a lack of trade and contact with the outside world, but as the authors show it's now emerging with undeniable potency. I read this book after returning from a 1996 visit and found it completely on-target.
At this writing over a decade later, China's rapid growth continues, the nation now has internet, Hong Kong and millions of international tourists. Also, mopeds are replacing many bicycles (adding to pollution), and more Chinese now travel and even live abroad - including some that live in my building. Overall this is a valuable if slightly dated look at a fascinating land and its people.
Great book.......2007-05-24
As a chinese who grown up in the late mao era, experienced the 89 movement in person, I have never seen a book (or article) on china that is so true to the reality and have done so well in presenting and dissecting the complexity of the transforming China.
Great book, except now is the time for a second one as the country has morphed so fast some chapters can be collected into history writings.
interesting, deeply flawed.......2007-05-07
This book is a fascinating case study of liberal journalists' setting themselves up as arbiters of morals, and their lack of patriotism. They boast at the beginning that they `went native' (their words) - talking Chinese at home, listening to Chinese music, trying to feel patriotic for China (yes, they say this in exactly those words). Their perspective on everything they report is: is it good for the Chinese people. Thus there is excellent reporting on human rights abuses, murder of females, soft prostitution and kidnapping of women. Issues such as corruption are covered but with a lot of apologetics.
In contrast to China Inc.(which I highly recommend), there is no reporting on the Chinese economic boom in the context of its impact on the rest of the world. There is little interest in China's lawless methods that are the base of their outstanding ability outcompete other nations - by stealing foreigners products, subsidizing Chinese industries and blocking other nations' imports, targeting specific industries to destroy in competitor nations, flaunting of their own legal safeguards for public safety and the environment etc. Nor is there any interest in the terrible effect that China's predatory economic practices are having on other developing nations (Mexico is a prime example) and on US economic future. No, our New York Times reporters are entirely focused on whether the boom is good for Chinese people. The author's reporting is very limited by their personal values and goals for China.
a. I did not find the book as outdated as some of my fellow reviewers who seem to think that a few more years of an economic bubble has created a new world with new rules. The authors do predict the fall of the latest emperor (communist party), based on the history of china - that corrupt regimes lose `the mandate of heaven' by their inevitable bad rule - but warn that such rot can take centuries (sic) before the fall. However, the authors acknowledge that the new factor is an economic boom despite corruption, so all predictions may be off.
b. In some ways they are full of idealist values, in other ways, they are moral midgets. The incident that drove me crazy was Kristoff's self-congratulatory boasting about his principled concern for his informants balanced by his journalistic mandate to report important news. His example was printing an article on slave labor products being sold although doing so risked the re-arrest and persecution of his informant and his entire family (and even though Kristoff admitted he was able to corroborate the information and didn't actually have to use or name this informant). He tells us in contrast when his moral scruples prevented him from printing a story. This is unbelievable: when a corrupt general offered Kristoff classified info on how China is selling Pakistan missiles that are capable of delivering nuclear warheads (an issue that the US was pursuing at the time and China denying) Kristoff proudly and sanctimoniously reports that he turned the guy down, thinking of the danger to the general's family if he were caught!!!!!! Kristoff also refused to give the general the home phone number of anyone in the US embassy, which the general begged him for. Apparently the sanctimonious Kristoff does not believe his work as a journalist includes publishing information on China's major role in nuclear proliferation in the Islamic world. He didn't seem to even notice that nuclear missiles in Islamic hands is a more potentially serious a threat to innocents as China's slave labor.
Similarly, the authors compare China's military adventurism to Germany before World War I, ancient Sparta and ancient Assyria - and then lecture the reader that we should accept China's imperialist foreign policy because it is normal in world history. I don't know why the authors are not just telling the facts and letting the read use their own moral and political values draw conclusions. Instead we are given the weird assessment that boils down to `grin and bear it.'
Here is another example of the authors setting themselves up as moral arbiters, which they are not very good at. Kristoff goes to great lengths to track down the man who betrayed the key organizers of Tianamen Square to the police. Kristoff tells us he was motivated by anger at this person. When he finally interviews him, he learns the man was neither tortured nor terrified with threats by the police. He betrayed his friends so he wouldn't be arrested himself, with the rationalization that he didn't think they'd be punished. Kristoff buys this weak rationalizing and "forgives" the man! Kristoff reveals himself as a moral midget in this story. He doesn't have the humility to realize that he does not have standing to forgive this traitor nor does he seem to understand that evil usually presents itself in this banal and hypocritical form. In any case, Kristoff has turned this tale into one of his own moral quest with the resolution being Kristoff the hero granting forgiveness. Where is the journalistic professionalism in all this?
As in so many other arenas, post-Watergate journalists seem to be caught up in tales starring themselves as moral authorities and whistle-blowers, and forgetting their much more important mandate to report `all the news that's fits to print.'
A good intro to China, but a bit sensationalistic in 10 years retrospect........2006-06-05
Written by two New York Times reporters, "China Wakes" provides a very penetrating view into Chinese culture, but at the same time, adopts a very selective and sensationalistic tone that in the end tends to exaggerate both the problems and the pluses of today's China.
By the time I read this, in 2006, the book was already over a decade old, and given how fast and drastically China has been changing over the past several decades, it's easy to dismiss this book as already irrelevant, and indeed, many of the topics it discusses are already dated. However, I still enjoyed reading China Wakes because it was an interesting exercise in comparing the authors' predictions with the results, more than 10 years later.
My personal verdict? I think as reporters for a world renowned newspaper, Kristoff and WuDunn had both the vigor to find fascinating stories and the writing skill to really capture the emotions and issues evolved, but at the same time, I think the unique position as reporters detracted from their credibility in making predictions for China's future. Exactly because they were reporters, they met the richest of the rich, the most corrupt of the corrupt, the poorest of the poor, and the most persecuted of the persucted. This self selecting, though admitted (albeit in the final chapter) by the authors, indeed does present a rather skewered, extremely bipolar image of China: in fact, the running theme of the book is reconciling the dual images of China as a vibrant economic miracle and China as a brutal and repressive "thugocracy." Unfortunately, because of this, it seems as most of their sensationalistic predictions, and the confidence in which they foresee the coming "collapse of the Communist dynasty," are misguided. Despite Deng Xiaoping's passing, despite Jiang Zemin's transfer of power to Hu Jintao, despite everything, nothing has changed; not the repressive government, not the economic boom. The reporter duo seemed to have missed their mark.
However, I enthusiastically give China Wakes a 4 out of 5 because the predictive element of this book is the only thing about it I elect to criticize. As I have mentioned, their skill as writers and journalist have lead them to capture and describe some of the most poignant, emotional, suggestive, and entertaining aspects of modern Chinese culture, and their book is organized in a succint factor that will help any newcomer to China break down Chinese affairs into digestable topics. All in all, this book provides an excellent window into seeing what China is and has to offer.
Eye opening book, despite being published 10 years ago.......2006-01-12
This book was published in 1994, when both writers--a married couple--were working for the New York Times out of their Beijing offices. The book does a great job of highlighting the awful record of human rights in China and is an overall outstanding work of reportage.
Among the topics discussed are China's human rights record, corruption, Tianamen, the booming economy, andthe fate of the communist party among others. This book is incredibly eye-opening and i recomend it not only for the China enthusiast, but for anyone who is a fan of good writing in general.
This book provides two outstanding perspectives. One, of Nicholas Kristof, an American, the view of a foreign journalist trying to explore and describe a country. And of Sheryl Wudunn, a Chinese-American, who is not only an outstanding reporter in everyway that Kristof is, but also has the unique insight of being of Chinese descent. This often allows her to gather information that Kristof (although they are married and share information) would not have been able to gather simply because of being recognized as a foreigner.
This book also does a wonderful job of showing 2 Chinas. the first, the China portreyed to the world by the Communist Party; and the other the China found in the poorest villages in china, telling the story that is often hidden from ordinary view.
A Great Read!
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China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power. (book reviews): An article from: Journal of International Affairs
Azeb Gessesse
Manufacturer: Columbia University School of International Public Affairs
ProductGroup: Book
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ASIN: B00096JXCQ
Release Date: 2005-07-28 |
Book Description
This digital document is an article from Journal of International Affairs, published by Columbia University School of International Public Affairs on January 1, 1996. The length of the article is 1520 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power. (book reviews)
Author: Azeb Gessesse
Publication:
Journal of International Affairs (Refereed)
Date: January 1, 1996
Publisher: Columbia University School of International Public Affairs
Volume: 49
Issue: n2
Page: 638-642
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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A Guide to Bird Finding West of the Mississippi
Olin Sewal Pettingill
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 019502818X |
Book Description
Here the inimitable Pettingill offers the definitive guide to birdwatching in the Western United States, illustrated with deft drawings by George Sutton. Like the companion volume on the eastern states, this book offers complete coverage of the best watching sites, the species, and much helpful information.
Books:
- The Valachi Papers
- They Found the Secret
- Traveling Music : The Soundtrack to My Life and Times
- Underboss: Sammy the Bull Gravano's Story of Life in the Mafia
- Unlimited Access: An FBI Agent Inside the Clinton White House
- Waylon: An Autobiography
- Within Reach: My Everest Story (Nonfiction)
- Women of Spirit: Stories of Courage from the Women Who Lived Them
- You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times
- A Field Guide to Getting Lost
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