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Kien Nguyen Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Kien Nguyen

Kien Nguyen

How to pronounce Kien Nguyen: Key-en Nwen (pronunciations vary, Nguyen can also be closer to When)

Kien Nguyen Biography

Kien Nguyen grew up an outsider in his native land. His once wealthy family, thrust into poverty at the dawn of a new political regime, lived among neighbors who treated them as pariahs, unwelcome remnants the colonialist past. Nguyen, himself a child of mixed race (his father was American), was among the most unwanted. He left Vietnam in 1985 through the United Nations "Orderly Departure Program." After spending time at a refugee camp in the Philippines, Nguyen arrived in the United States.

Nguyen's memoir, The Unwanted, tells of his experience. He has written two other books, The Tapestries and Le Colonial. He lives in New York City.



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Interview

Kien Nguyen talks about his memories of his grandfather whose true story provides the inspiration for Nguyen's first novel.

I was six days old when my grandfather first told me his life stories. I was lying in a small bamboo cradle suspended by ropes from a high wooden beam. From the window, the summer sky shone like an inverted ocean, motionless except for a few distant clouds. Hummingbirds fluttered over the garden fountain, then disappeared into the pomegranate trees.

While the ceiling swayed he would speak to me in a melodic tone, always with the same introduction: "During the winter months, the Perfume River was chilly, especially at dawn." In my recollection, the world of my grandfather was simple, irregular, and deliberately void of anything material. No photo albums or mementos helped illustrate his tales, only his soothing voice, flowing in the river of his memory.

At times, my grandmother would join him. In the background, she would pluck the strings of her lute and sing Vietnamese folk songs. Between the two of them, my childhood was filled with wonder. I could always close my eyes and allow myself to be transported back to a time when my grandfather was a child. While in the rest of the world, children grew up with fairy tales, I lived in my grandfather's stream of consciousness, feasting on his thoughts, feeling ...

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Books by this Author

Books by Kien Nguyen at BookBrowse
Le Colonial jacket The Tapestries jacket The Unwanted jacket
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All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Kien Nguyen but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
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