3 Books To Read

I used to be the biggest bookworm as a child. When I was bored, I preferred to
bury myself deep into as many cheesy YA novels as I could. High school, however,
killed my passion for reading. As good as the books we were reading were, I never
enjoyed having to analyze what sometimes felt like arbitrary literary choices.

The electives I took my senior year helped me fall back in love with reading. During my first
semester of senior year, I took Asian American Literature and followed that with the Art
of Memoir. Unlike the books I read in earlier classes, these books covered topics
relevant to the world and my identity and gave me a new language to describe my
circumstances and thoughts. With that said, here are some of my favorite books I
recommend to anyone trying to engage in larger conversations.

Some honorable mentions!
● Jhumpa Lahiri’s Unaccustomed Earth
● Joan Didion’s A Year of Magical Thinking

Now to my favorites.
1. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen follows an unnamed half-French,
half-Vietnamese double agent fleeing war-torn Vietnam and his journey as a
refugee. While he frames the story as a confession of his treason to a
Vietnamese general but reads instead like a memoir of his life. Ngyuen isn’t
afraid to describe violent deaths and explicit scenes, but he also details tender
stories about his childhood, love affairs, and closest friends. The Sympathizer
ultimately answers questions regarding identity, sexuality, and survival. What I
love about the book is how Ngyuen makes abstract concepts more tangible, and
the way Ngyuen writes about grief and love has helped me better appreciate my
life and those who have helped me along the way.

2. Brother I’m Dying by Edwidge Danticat is an incredible memoir of her life as she
navigates her father’s gradual decline, pregnancy, and time in Haiti. You need to
pay attention to everything she writes to take it all in, as she uses numerous
motifs and callbacks to different chapters. Because of her life experiences, she
has so much to say about the meaning of living authentically and the importance
of using your voice. It’s a hard book to summarize because each chapter details
a different part of her life, but I cannot recommend it enough.

3. Alexander Chee’s How to Write an Autobiographical Memoir takes the cake for
the most heart-wrenching book I have read; I cried at least five times while
reading that book. Before starting this book, one must understand the context of
Chee’s life as a queer biracial man reaching adulthood during the height of the
AIDS epidemic. First off, I love the way he writes about writing and the act of
creating. As a fellow writer, the topic resonates with me deeply, and I appreciate
his advice to young writers. Chee also perfectly balances his privilege as a
wealthy writer alongside his marginalized identity. Finally, the ending of this book
is one of my favorites of all time. It’s not much of a spoiler; this book is a collection of stories from his life. He ends the book by talking about writing for the dead and telling stories on behalf of the people who can’t. It’s such a powerful book, and I wish I could read it again for the first time.