The Man From Saigon reminded us the war that help to destroy a president and briefly empowered a generation (ours) did not change our country as fundamentally as we once believed it had. Tragically, the war built on lies and domino theories and paranoia did not prevent us from becoming embroiled in a war built on lies and paranoid fears about terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan. Did not prevent us from years and years of brutalization of a people--"innocent" and "guilty". Of fighting an enemy whose shape shifting led to mistrust of a whole race. "Gooks" --"Towelheads"... The parallels make this book relevant for us now.
We all commented on the one thing that has changed. Even in this day of ubiquitous screens, the images of the war are no longer bombarding our senses day after day. So we tolerate the unseen far away. We tolerate the drones. We feel safe as we create new generations full of anger at our country.
Vietnam is now a nation that welcomes American tourists...some of our b.g. members have visited. Will that be true in Afghanistan? Iraq?
.........
The book tells the story from the point of view of an embedded female magazine reporter, her Vietnamese photographer, Son, and TV news reporter. It is a love story--a triangle of sorts--that is intriguing and moving. You care.
One member wanted to discuss the choppiness of the structure--the back and forth from present to past. The very feature that disturbed the above mentioned dissenting b.g. member. (To be fair, she was reading quickly to finish in time...perhaps that was what was disturbing.)
After the meeting I read a review that says the choppiness was deliberate and intended to build tension and to mirror how a person in a perilous situation would actually think...constantly being jerked back into reality of mortal danger after drifting back into heightened memories of the past.
Another member, this blogger, was bothered that Son, the photographer, was the inscrutable Asian. An "Oriental" whose true self was hidden from westerners. Was he the man from Saigon or the man from Hanoi?
But he also is a character that you care about ... You want him to survive. You want him to find happiness and love. You want him to find peace in the Vietnam of his picture map--of natural beauty.
Read it. Comment.
