The Sorrow Of War by Bao Ninh

 

Despite the title this books offers a great deal of hope and restoration after war. As I discussed with author Nguyen Phan Que Ma, the fiction that comes from Vietnamese perspective of the Vietnam War could have been just as easily about Berlin in 1941, Richmond in 1865 or Baghdad in 2016, which speaks to the universality of war and the effects on those called to fight for their beliefs. Ninh pulls your heart through a strainer as he writes. You painfully see the effects of the war on his character's mental and physical states. No man or women goes to war and returns untouched. Ninh captures this with searing detail.  I recommend this book to anyone curious about the Vietnam War as a counterbalance to our Amerocentric viewpoints.