Finished: On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (Vuong) An excellent book of the life story of a Vietnamese family, mother, son and grandmother, told in a letter from the son, now in his twenties, to his mother. Not a story in the traditional sense, but a compilation of beautiful prose, of thoughts and life experiences and revelations as Little Dog, as he's known, remembers in vivid detail the horrors both his mother and grandmother shared with him about living in Vietnam during the war; about coming to America and struggling to fit in and live; and opens up to his mother about the homosexual relationship he had as a young teen, his first love, who meant so much to him. Vuong paints such a vivid picture with every word that I could actually feel the pain, the sorrow and the love from each character. Here are a couple of snippets I liked:

"You once told me that the human eye is god's loneliest creation. How so much of the world passes through the pupil and still it holds nothing. The eye, alone in its socket, doesn't even know there's another one, just like it, an inch away, just as hungry, as empty. Opening the front door to the first snowfall of my life, you whispered, "Look." "

And this one wrecked my heart as Little Dog was watching his mother and aunt cater to their dying mother's body and wishes. It is so true.

"We try to preserve life--even when we know it has no chance of enduring its body. We feed it, keep it comfortable, bathe it, medicate it, caress it, even sing to it. We tend to these basic functions not because we are brave or selfless but because, like breath, it is the most fundamental act of our species: to sustain the body until time leaves it behind."

This book will stay in my thoughts for quite awhile.