- Hardcover: 271 pages
- Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf; 1 edition (6 May 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 030726808X
- ISBN-13: 978-0307268082
- Product Dimensions: 21.1 x 14.2 x 2.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,507,323 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Boat
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
'Each voice is achingly present and authentic.' --Guardian
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Chris Offutt
Nam Le writes with a rare blend of courage and beauty.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The Boat, a collection of short stories by Nam Le, came to me as one of two books, for achieving the short list for the Litopia short story competition on the subject "First Twin".
In his opening story, Le plays an authorial game. A member of a writing group claims he is sick of "ethnic lit", of writers posing on jacket covers in traditional costume, of stories with descriptions of exotic food. Nam Le is Vietnamese, a member of a writing group and every one of his stories concerns a different type of ethnicity and, of course, contains a mention of some ethnic dish.
This sly humour is characteristic and refreshing. It's needed, because the subject matter is often dark. A child describes his life as an evacuee from his native city. American planes fly overhead on secret missions, his parents visit, reassure him; then return to Hiroshima. A Colombian hitman, barely into his teens, discovers love, loyalty and the price of friendship. An aging artist receives news of terminal illness and desperately attempts to contact his beloved, estranged daughter. A Vietnamese girl boards a boat crammed with other illegal immigrants. A storm blows them off course and supplies of water and food begin to run out.
It's a moving, stunning collection of tales and if Le occasionally allows allusiveness to descend into incoherence, it's forgivable, because these are stories which should drift into silence, rather than end with a bang. And it's only at the end that the point Le makes at the beginning becomes clear: however different our background and experience may appear to make us, just under the surface, we're all human.
In his opening story, Le plays an authorial game. A member of a writing group claims he is sick of "ethnic lit", of writers posing on jacket covers in traditional costume, of stories with descriptions of exotic food. Nam Le is Vietnamese, a member of a writing group and every one of his stories concerns a different type of ethnicity and, of course, contains a mention of some ethnic dish.
This sly humour is characteristic and refreshing. It's needed, because the subject matter is often dark. A child describes his life as an evacuee from his native city. American planes fly overhead on secret missions, his parents visit, reassure him; then return to Hiroshima. A Colombian hitman, barely into his teens, discovers love, loyalty and the price of friendship. An aging artist receives news of terminal illness and desperately attempts to contact his beloved, estranged daughter. A Vietnamese girl boards a boat crammed with other illegal immigrants. A storm blows them off course and supplies of water and food begin to run out.
It's a moving, stunning collection of tales and if Le occasionally allows allusiveness to descend into incoherence, it's forgivable, because these are stories which should drift into silence, rather than end with a bang. And it's only at the end that the point Le makes at the beginning becomes clear: however different our background and experience may appear to make us, just under the surface, we're all human.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I am not normally a fan of short stories but this one took me by surprise. They are a collection of culturally very different and quite dark stories of great imagination. Exceedingly well written and like it says on the cover - these stories are to be read once and them to come back to again.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This collection of short stories won't bore you. They are all very different when it comes to setting and characters. Reading the first story sort of explains it all though. You get a feeling that the main character in the first story is the writer himself - who's got a Vietnamese origin - and he's being told that he should write about his past, about what he knows about his people. Which he does in the last story. In between he takes us to Tehran, Hiroshima and South America.
My favourite stories are "Elise" (relationship between father and daughter) and "Tehran calling" (relationship between two old female friends).
Lee is good at describing every day life even if this every day life is set in extreme circumstances. It's still the people I care about, even if I'd like to know more about them. Some of the endings leave me wondering too much.
My favourite stories are "Elise" (relationship between father and daughter) and "Tehran calling" (relationship between two old female friends).
Lee is good at describing every day life even if this every day life is set in extreme circumstances. It's still the people I care about, even if I'd like to know more about them. Some of the endings leave me wondering too much.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
`The storm came on quickly.'
This collection of short stories is Nam Le's first book. It's a wonderful collection of seven stories, set in different cultures, contexts and countries. Read more
Published 13 months ago by J. Cameron-Smith
The Boat - Nam Le
This is an excellent collection of short stories - varied in content but uniformly well written and evocative and I agreed with one critic that the stories would certainly bear... Read more
Published on 14 April 2009 by B. M. Bennett
A Promising Collection
The Boat is a collection of short stories - seven of them, with the longest approaching novella length, They are diverse; each with a very different scenario - ranging from bandits... Read more
Published on 12 Dec 2008 by MisterHobgoblin
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
