Viet Thanh Nguyen: Book Intro Slider

Skip to content To Save and to Destroy: Writing as an Other Born in war-ravaged Vietnam, Viet Nguyen arrived in the United States as a child refugee in 1975. The Nguyen family would soon move to San Jose, California, where the author grew up, attending UC Berkeley in the aftermath of the shocking murder of Vincent Chin, which shaped the political sensibilities of a new generation of Asian Americans. Buy it The Cleaving The Cleaving brings together Vietnamese artists and writers from around the world in conversation about their craft and how their work has been shaped and received by mainstream culture and their own communities. This collection highlights how Vietnamese diasporic writers speak about having been cleaved—a condition in which they have been separated from, yet still hew to, the country that they have left behind. Buy it Simone

From Pulitzer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen and illustrator Minnie Phan comes an unforgettable story of a Vietnamese American girl whose life is transformed by a wildfire.

Kirkus Reviews says “Stunning…. a powerful, multilayered depiction of an increasingly common situation.”

Buy it A Man of Two Faces

With insight, humor, formal invention, and lyricism, in A Man of Two Faces Viet Thanh Nguyen rewinds the film of his own life in a highly original, blistering, and unconventional memoir.

He expands the genre of personal memoir by acknowledging larger stories of refugeehood, colonization, and ideas about Vietnam and America.

Buy it The Committed The sequel to The Sympathizer is here in March 2021! Our nameless antihero is no longer a spy as he stumbles into Paris and a life of drugs, crime, gangs, and politics. Both literary thriller and brilliant novel of ideas, The Committed is a blistering portrayal of commitment and betrayal. Buy it Chicken of the Sea From the playful mind of Viet’s then 5-year old son Ellison came the story for Chicken of the Sea, about chickens who become pirates. Viet elaborated on Ellison’s idea, while Thi Bui and her 13-year old son Hien illustrated this fowl epic. Buy it The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives Of The Displaced, The Economist says that “If the world’s 65.5 million forcibly displaced people formed their own country, it would be the 21st-largest…one of the many things that this imaginary nation lacks…is a literary canon. In this collection, Viet Thanh Nguyen begins to assemble one.” Buy it The Refugees

The Refugees is a collection of perfectly formed stories written over a period of twenty years, exploring questions of immigration, identity, love, and family.

Kirkus Reviews says “many of the stories might have been written by a modern Flaubert, if that master had spent time in San Jose or Ho Chi Minh City.” Buy it

Voices for Gaza | Speaker Highlights

December 18, 2025

VOICES FOR GAZA was a tremendously moving event that brought together Palestinian writers and activists and their allies to speak about Gaza, Palestine, and genocide.

le Symathisant |

December 4, 2025

The French really love bandes dessinées (comics). Here is the adaptation of The Sympathizer as Le Sympathisant, written by Antoine Ozanam, illustrated by Jai Baek,

Los Angeles Book Review | On Adaptation: From Page to Screen

November 16, 2025

In November 2024, writers Viet Thanh Nguyen, Jonathan Ames, Anna Dorn, and Jane Hu gathered at LITLIT for a discussion with Paul Thompson about how

Hankyung | [책마을] 비엣 타인 응우옌 진실을 말하려는 작가, 필연적으로 정치 다뤄야

November 7, 2025

구은서 기자  소설가 비엣 타인 응우옌 에세이 ‘두 얼굴의 남자’ 출간 “어떻게 하면 강하면서 동시에 약한 어머니를 이해할 수 있을지 고민하다가 글을 쓰기 시작했습니다. 어머니는

Newsis | ‘퓰리처상’ 응우옌 트럼프, 미국 문화에 있어 최악의 산물… 美, 다양성 취약해져

November 5, 2025

자전적 에세이 ‘두 얼굴의 남자’ 국내 번역 출간 “진실 이야기하는 작가라면 정치 이야기 해야” 박찬욱의 ‘동조자’ 원작자…”나와 생각 비슷해” [서울=뉴시스] 작가 비엣 타인 응우옌. (사진=민음사

Moonhwa | “트럼프에 관심주기 싫어 책에서 그 이름을 … 로 표기”

November 5, 2025

인지현 기자 퓰리처상 응우옌, 첫 에세이 “좋은 정치적 문학 달성이 꿈” “도널드 트럼프 미국 대통령은 사람들로부터 관심받는 것을 좋아합니다. 그를 삶에서 지워버리기 어렵게 만드는 것이 트럼프

Viet’s Books

books

To Save and to Destroy: Writing as an Other

The Cleaving

Simone

A Man of Two Faces

The Committed

Chicken of the Sea

The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

The Refugees

Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War

The Sympathizer

Transpacific Studies: Framing an Emerging Field

Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America

About Viet Thanh Nguyen

Viet Thanh Nguyen’s novel The Sympathizer won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and numerous other awards. His most recent publication is his memoir, A Man of Two Faces. His other books are the sequel to The Sympathizer, The Committed; a short story collection, The Refugees; Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War (a finalist for the National Book Award in nonfiction and the National Book Critics Circle Award in General Nonfiction); and Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America. He has also published Chicken of the Sea, a children’s book written in collaboration with his son, Ellison. He is a University Professor, the Aerol Arnold Chair of English, and a Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Comparative Literature at the University of Southern California. A recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim and MacArthur Foundations, he is also the editor of The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives.

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