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Loading... On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel (original 2019; edition 2019)by Ocean Vuong (Author)
Work InformationOn Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong (2019)
![]() Books Read in 2020 (105) » 34 more Books Read in 2019 (96) Best LGBT Fiction (35) Favourite Books (782) Top Five Books of 2023 (362) Books Read in 2021 (1,321) AP Lit (60) Penguin Random House (19) New England Books (37) Books Read in 2023 (2,518) Indie Next Picks (19) 2010s (3) Facebook list (8) To Read (588) Asia (77) BookTok Adult (34) Five star books (1,586) No current Talk conversations about this book. ![]() ![]() Not a good match for me. There were parts that were good- the immigrant experience, the underbelly of US society, the character of his grandmother Lan, but also parts that were gratuitous like cruelty to animals and the mechanical details of sex that seemed to have been randomly inserted just because. The prose is fine in general and there are some good lines, though I wasn’t enraptured as others seem to have been, which is a similar experience to how his poetry has struck me. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous follows Little Dog through a letter to his mother. His whole life, he has lived in a limbo between two different cultures and languages, which have hindered his ability to connect with his mother. So, he uses this letter, despite his mother being illiterate, to create a form of connection with her through language, which he has never been able to fully achieve. The writing is exquisite and beautiful, filled with poetry, prose, and musings on life and human connections. It works really well at showing the disconnect Little Dog has with language and communicating, specifically with his mother. I listened to this on audiobook, and I will absolutely be purchasing this book so I can re-read and annotate it. Trigger warnings: - Vietnam war - Animal abuse - Homophobia - Xenophobia/racism - Abuse (domestic, child, sexual) no reviews | add a review
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"On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family's history that began before he was born -- a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam -- and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity."-- No library descriptions found.
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![]() GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyLC ClassificationRatingAverage:![]()
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