- Fiction, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, LGBT
One late summer evening in the post-industrial town of East Gladness, Connecticut, nineteen-year-old Hai stands on the edge of a bridge in pelting rain, ready to jump, when he hears someone shout across the river. The voice belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow succumbing to dementia, who convinces him to take another path. Bereft and out of options, he quickly becomes her caretaker. Over the course of the year, the unlikely pair develops a life-altering bond, one built on empathy, spiritual reckoning, and heartbreak, with the power to alter Hai’s relationship to himself, his family, and a community at the brink.
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Character
Contemporary, grave, earnest and prestige.
- contemporarynostalgic
- gravecomic
- earnestironic
- unpretentiousprestige
- contemplativerelentless
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About the book
- Author
- Ocean Vuong
- First published
- 2025
- Pages
- 416
- Publisher
- Penguin Press, Diversified Publishing, Jonathan Cape
- Editions
- 7
- Language
- English, Dutch
- ISBN
- 9780593831878
Where to read
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On Open Library, 4 have read it and 41 want to.
“The hardest thing in the world is to live only once.”
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