From the Bookshelves: Shock Peace: The Search for Freedom by Ciecie Tuyet Nguyen
Shock Peace: The Search for Freedom by Ciecie Tuyet Nguyen
With the anniversary of the start of the Vietnam War occurring on November 1, we will take the time to stop and remember those who served and lost their lives for our country. But do we ever stop to think of those who were impacted on the other side of the war? Shock Peace: The Search for Freedom by author and refugee CieCie Tuyet Nguyen explores the war from a different perspective: that of a survivor in the fall of Saigon who unflinchingly recounts the horrors of life after the Vietnam War.
A fictional account based on historical facts and the personal experiences of the author, Shock Peace follows young Trinh’s journey as she searches for freedom. A Vietnamese teenager, Trinh has lived through the dark days that led to the fall of Saigon in 1975 and three years under the new regime. The book follows Trinh as she witnesses human rights and freedom stripped brutally away from herself, her family and her countrymen. After struggling with poverty, starvation, desperation, and control, the yearning for freedom propels Trinh and her family to make a daring move – an attempt to escape by boat and face the threat of attack by pirates. At the cost of freedom, 500,000 of her countrymen had perished, most by drowning as they tried to flee. Will Trinh’s family be able to find the freedom they seek?
A moving statement on the strength of the human heart, themes recounted in Shock Peace: The Search for Freedom include:
- The true account of what had happened to South Vietnam during the first decade after the fall of Saigon
- The life stories of Saigon’s refugees and their tragedies in Vietnam’s darkest period, when peace, prosperity and reunification were supposed to emerge from the ashes.
- How human rights, peace and freedom are the best gifts your country has given you.
- While unexpected circumstances might change one’s life for the worse, with the resilience to survive, one might be able to get back to where they once were.
- That cruelty should be exposed not to bring about revenge or to lead to war, but to bring empathy and change.
KJ