Runner-up for the 2021 Dayton Literary Peace Prize
Selected as a Best Book of 2020 by NB Magazine * BookBrowse * Buzz Magazine * NPR * Washington Independent Review of Books * Real Simple * She Reads * A Hindu's View * Thoughts from a Page
THE BESTSELLING STORY OF TWO GENERATIONS OF WOMEN WHOSE LIVES ARE CHANGED FOREVER BY THE VIET NAM WAR
Ha Noi, 1972. Hương and her grandmother, Trần Diệu Lan, cling to one another in their improvised shelter as American bombs fall around them. For Trần Diệu Lan, forced to flee the family farm with her six children decades earlier as the Communist government rose to power in the North, this experience is horribly familiar. Seen through the eyes of these two unforgettable women, The Mountains Sing captures their defiance and determination, hope and unexpected joy.
Vivid, gripping, and steeped in the language and traditions of Việt Nam, celebrated Vietnamese poet Nguyễn’s richly lyrical debut weaves between the lives of a grandmother and granddaughter to paint a unique picture of a country pushed to breaking point, and a family who refuse to give up.
The Mountains Sing by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai
Born and raised in Việt Nam, Dr. Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai (pronounced ŋwiən fα:n kwey mai) is the author of the global best-selling novels The Mountains Sing and Dust Child, Winner of the BookBrowse Best Debut Award, the International Book Awards, the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award, the Nota Bene Prize, the Rhegium Julii Award, the Lannan Literary Award Fellowship for Fiction, as well as Runner-up for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. She has published twelve books of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction in Vietnamese and English and has received some of the top literary prizes in Việt Nam. Her writing has been translated into more than twenty languages and has appeared in major publications, including The New York Times. Quế Mai is a translator of ten books of poetry and fiction from English into Vietnamese and vice versa. She has a PhD in creative writing from the UK's Lancaster University. She is an advocate for the rights of disadvantaged groups in Việt Nam and was named by Forbes Việt Nam as one of twenty inspiring women of 2021.