Meeting on a very human level is one of the best ways to bridge a cultural gap, and Beyond the Rice Paddies gives readers an opportunity to meet, Oanh, a young Vietnamese girl as she recounts her life and experiences during the Vietnam War. The writing is simple and childlike, yet engaging, and an almost pragmatic approach to some incidents makes them more dramatic.
For instance, the contrast between how a dead Viet Cong body is treated and how the body of a village boy is treated is stark. Both are left in the town square to be identified and claimed by family, but the body of the Viet Cong lies for days in the sun because the family is afraid to claim it. Of course, the child narrator doesn’t know this. She and the other village children only know that the body has begun to stink.
To a child, the war has no context, and her concerns are only for how it affects her daily life. Like when she hears gunshots in the night and knows the Viet Cong have breached the wall behind their house and she has to hide in the hole dug beneath her bed. That’s when the war is real. When gunshots ring out and bullets tear holes in the walls of her house. Only the presence of her grandmother, Ba Noi, can calm her fear and stop the pounding of her heart.
Oanh lives with her grandmother because her mother “works” in Saigon, and her father has gone to live with his first wife and that family. Ba Noi is a woman of simple means and simple wisdom, telling Oanh at one point to “let go of the hate. Be kind and mindful to your heart.” This counsel is given when other children have ripped the pretty dress Oanh’s mother brought her from Saigon.
Another time Ba Noi warns of the danger of Viet Cong infiltrating their village and looking for traitors to their cause. “Be mindful of what you say to others. It is best not to say anything.”
That is good advice for anyone in any circumstance or place.
I really enjoyed this book. Coming from a subsidy publisher, I didn’t expect the book to read as smoothly as it does, and it only has a few places where a good editor might have improved the writing.
About the Author
Linda West, whose name at birth was Tran Thi Back Yen Oanh, immigrated to the United States from Bien Hoa, Vietnam, at the age of ten. The author is donating half of her royalties from the book to the Vietnam Veterans of America and the American Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. She also is contributing another portion of her royalties to cover the costs of rebuilding her grade school in Bien Hoa. West, a mother of three grown children, owns and operates a residential real estate company in Tucson, Arizona.
Beyond the Rice Paddies
Linda West
Booksurge
ISBN: 978-1-4196-7555-3
Paperback - 109 pages - $11.95
Beyond the Rice Paddies is available for sale online at Amazon.com, BookSurge.com, Beyondthericepaddies.com and through additional wholesale and retail channels worldwide.
Maryann Miller — Maryann’s Blog
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2 users commented in " Book Review: Beyond the Rice Paddies by Linda West "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackLinda West writes an intriguing page burner that tends to draw the reader in with simple calming emotions of heart felt empathy for a young girl whose own heart is full of empathy and Love. My heart bleeds for those left behind.
‘Beyond the Rice Paddies’ has the potential of a great book.
This is a well-crafted look through a little girl’s eyes at an often sweet and sometimes dark childhood. Remember where you were when the Vietnam War was being fought? If you are Ms. West’s age and living in the U.S., chances are you were enjoying a far different upbringing. In “Beyond the Rice Paddies,” she gives us a compelling snapshot of what it was like to grow up as war raged around her home in Vietnam. The vignettes are written in first person, which gives them a dreamy quality of recollection and add feeling to the author’s remembrance of a life lived in what now must seem like a strange time and place. It is refreshing to read a book written by someone who is grateful to American troops for the battles they fought. Ms. West refers to the soldiers who marched through her village as “giants,” a phrase she uses to describe how they appeared to a little girl, but perhaps also a revealing insight into how she feels about those brave and honorable men. I finished the book hoping for an epilogue. There wasn’t one, but perhaps that is the basis for her next book. Well done.
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