Janet TAY reviews Nam LE's The Boat (Canongate, 2008)

Seven wonders
A Vietnamese-Australian writer’s first book explores many different aspects of human strife

Review by JANET TAY

THE BOAT
By Nam Le
(Canongate Books, 288pp)

NAM LE was a name I discovered thanks to a short story that was published in the Summer 2006 issue of Zoetrope All-Story, an American literary magazine launched in 1997 by Hollywood filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola.

The magazine showcases work by emerging and established writers, and its many contributors have included the likes of 2007 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award-winner Miranda July, Salman Rushdie, Alice Munro and Gabriel Garcia Márquez.

As for Le—who was born in Vietnam, raised in Australia and is the fiction editor of the Harvard Review—his début collection of stories, The Boat, has followed his work for Zoetrope as well as that for other venues like the Best American Nonrequired Reading, Best New American Voices and Best Australian Stories. The book was recently published in Britain, Australia and the United States.

His story in Zoetrope titled “Love and Honour and Pity and Pride and Compassion and Sacrifice” is the first story in The Boat. The account is perhaps an autobiographical one—the protagonist is a young Aussie writer of Vietnamese descent named Nam, and the story is set in his final year at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop (in the US).

He is visited by his father from Australia and this results in quiet clashes between the two men who are unable to reconcile the differences that exist between them.

“Cartagena” is a surprising second story in this collection of seven. As readers leave Nam and his father in a wistful winter scene in Iowa, tropical Colombia is a confusing but not an uninteresting change. It takes a while to fully immerse oneself in the world of Colombian petty drug pushers and youths who get mixed up with hard core criminals, but Le’s deft and confident use of language and storytelling skills are convincing.

The story is of Juan Pablo Merendez (or Ron, as people call him) and his friends who become entangled with Colombian drug lords for whom murder and drug-trafficking are an everyday business. There is something familiarly (Quentin) Tarantino-esque about the scenes in “Cartagena,” but Le manages to pull off a somewhat authentic insight into the sinister world of organised crime.

From the underbelly of Colombia we move to New York, where a painter—middle-aged Henry Luff—faces an almost certain diagnosis of colorectal cancer. He yearns to meet his daughter, Elise, who he has not seen in 17 years. His young lover, Olivia, who was his nude model has died of cancer. In this story, Le explores the harsh reality of love, complex relationships and detached human behaviour.

Of love, Le brutally and beautifully describes sensuousness and passion in wonderfully unvarnished terms: “I’m watching her eat, sloppily, lips smeared with mango juice, sweet with the nectar of plums. I never thought it would be me: the painter who falls for his nude model .... Then she smiles. I drag her toward me, fend her off. Through it all, she loves hitting me. Her lips turn martial. Afterward we fall apart, marks on our bodies, smelling of fruit and mineral spirits, soap and charcoal.”

The third story, “Halflead Bay,” depicts the trials and tribulations of an Australian boy who worries about fighting with a bully named Dory at school. There’s also Allison, a girl he likes but is rumoured to be Dory’s girlfriend, and his mother who is dying from multiple sclerosis.

Then we change country and continent, and Le takes us to “Hiroshima” for the perspective of a young girl during World War II.

He then takes readers to Iran in “Tehran Calling,” where Sarah Middleton decides to visit her friend, Parvin, despite the political upheaval in the city. Here, Le continues to demonstrate his ability to take on a different voice—that of an American woman who tries to get over a broken love affair despite being caught in the middle of all the unrest.

The last story in the collection is the title story. With this, The Boat seems to have come full circle. The collection starts with a story that echoes the past of Vietnamese refugees and ends with a tale of their journey to better lands.

A vividly bleak image is painted by Le when depicting the harsh, inhumane conditions suffered by the refugees in their journey to escape the war in their homeland, the smell of death and decay, the vomit and staleness of unwashed bodies, but also the resilience of the human spirit in its persistence to survive.

Le’s ability to inhabit different lives with an impressive degree of precision lends credence to his collection of stories.

In a time when publishers and agents are loath to take risks with short-story collections, The Boat shows that an open mind can lead to a rewarding discovery of promising new talent.
Nam Le is certainly the new voice in literature to watch.

JANET TAY is a litigation lawyer by training, but decided to leave the legal profession to pursue her first love—books and writing. She is now a book editor with a Malaysian publishing house in Kuala Lumpur. She is also working towards a Master’s degree in English Literature at Universiti Malaya. She enjoys reviewing literary fiction.

Review first published in The Sunday Star of August 31, 2008

Here’s the unedited version of the review:

Inhabiting Different Lives

THE BOAT
By Nam Le
(Canongate Books, 288pp)

Review by JANET TAY

NAM LE was a name first known to me through a short story he had published in the Summer 2006 issue of Zoetrope All-Story, an American literary magazine launched in 1997 by Francis Ford Coppola. Zoetrope has showcased work by emerging and established writers alike, such as the 2007 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award-winner Miranda July, together with veterans such as Salman Rushdie, Alice Munro, Gabriel Garcia Márquez and many more. Less than two years after the publication of his story in Zoetrope, Le’s début collection of stories, The Boat, has been published in Britain, Australia and the U.S.

The story published in Zoetrope entitled ‘Love and Honour and Pity and Pride and Compassion and Sacrifice’ is also the first story in The Boat. The account tempts the reader to think it a semi-autobiographical one—the protagonist is a young Australian writer of Vietnamese descent named Nam, and is in his final year at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Nam is visited by his father from Australia—a 33-hour journey that culminates in quiet clashes between father and son who are unable to reconcile the differences that naturally exist between them, either from generational gaps or Nam’s yearning to be free from his father’s draconian rules. Nam’s father was a soldier during the Vietnam War and is haunted by his past; Nam tries to overcome his misgivings about his father, a strict man who had brought him up with rules that, once broken, come with heavy prices to pay, by both Nam and his mother.

‘Cartagena’ is a surprising second story in this collection of seven. Leaving Nam and his father in a wistful winter scene in Iowa, tropical Colombia is a confusing but not uninteresting change. It takes a while to fully immerse oneself in the world of Colombian petty drug pushers and youths who get mixed up with hard core criminals, but Le’s deft and confident use of language and storytelling skills is convincing. Juan Pablo Merendez, or Ron, as people call him, and his friends becomes entangled with Colombian drug lords, for whom murder and drug-trafficking are an everyday business. There is something that is familiarly Tarantino-esque about the scenes in ‘Cartagena’—a complimentary observation—and despite the suddenness of the transition in setting, Le manages to pull off a somewhat authentic insight into the sinister world of organised crime.

From the underbelly of Colombia we move to New York, where a painter, middle-aged Henry Luff, who faces an almost certain diagnosis of colorectal cancer, yearns to meet his daughter Elise, whom he had not seen in 17 years after her mother had left him due to his infidelity. His young lover, Olivia, was his nude model who had died of cancer. In this story, Nam Le explores the harsh reality of love and complex relationships, and detached human behaviour, and does so in decidedly blunt terms: “She acts like she sees this every day: a sweat-drenched man, naked save for his white wing-tip formal shirt, blood leaking from his ass, lying in a fetal position, shakily smoking a cigarette. Her coolness feels familiar to me.”

Of love, Le brutally and beautifully describes sensuousness and passion. There is no neatness with Le, who takes the situation in its nakedness and presents to the world the aesthetics of unvarnished truths: “I’m watching her eat, sloppily, lips smeared with mango juice, sweet with the nectar of plums. I never thought it would be me: the painter who falls for his nude model. I love that, she says. What? When you look at me too long. Then she smiles. I drag her toward me, fend her off. Through it all, she loves hitting me. Her lips turn martial. Afterward we fall apart, marks on our bodies, smelling of fruit and mineral spirits, soap and charcoal. You’re a dirty old man, she says, giving me her best dirty young girl look, steering my cigaretted hand to her lips.”

The third story, ‘Halflead Bay,’ depicts the trials and tribulations of an Australian boy who worries about fighting with a bully named Dory at school; Allison, a girl he likes but is rumoured to be Dory’s girlfriend; and his mother who is dying from multiple sclerosis. Change country and continent, again, and Le takes us to ‘Hiroshima’—the perspective of a young girl during the Second World War before the horrific bombing of Hiroshima. Yet another unlikely setting follows—that of Iran in ‘Tehran Calling’, where Sarah Middleton visits her friend, Parvin, who is caught up in political upheaval in Tehran. Here Le continues to demonstrate his ability to take on a different voice—an American woman who tries to get over a broken love affair in the middle of political troubles in Iran.

The last story in the collection is the title story. With this, The Boat seems to have come full circle. The collection starts with a story that merely echoes the past of the Vietnamese refugees, and ends with an actual tale of their journey to better lands. A vividly bleak imagery is painted by Le, depicting the harsh, inhumane conditions suffered by the refugees in their journey to escape the war back home: the smell of death and decay, vomit and staleness of unwashed bodies, but also the resilience of the human spirit in its persistence to survive. Le’s ability to inhabit different lives with an impressive degree of precision lends credence to this collection of stories.

In a time when publishers and agents are loath to take risks with short-story collections, The Boat shows that an open mind can lead to a rewarding discovery of promising new talent. Perhaps, in anticipation of readers who may wonder why Le chooses to write vastly different narratives when he “could totally exploit the Vietnamese thing,” but instead writes about “lesbian vampires and Colombian assassins, and Hiroshima orphans—and New York painters with haemorrhoids,” Le’s answer is The Boat—proof that writers do not have to cater to perceived market demands if their voices are strong enough to transcend captious criticism. Nam Le is certainly the new voice in literature to watch.