| The Eaves of Heaven: A Life in Three Wars | 
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Avg. Customer Rating:   (based on 5 reviews)
Sales Rank: 40854
Category: Book
Author: Andrew X. Pham
Publisher: Harmony
Studio: Harmony
Manufacturer: Harmony
Label: Harmony
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.2
ISBN: 030738120X
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.0495
EAN: 9780307381200
ASIN: 030738120X
Publication Date: June 3, 2008
Release Date: June 3, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
From Andrew X. Pham, the award-winning author of Catfish and Mandala, a son?s searing memoir of his Vietnamese father?s experiences over the course of three wars.
The Philadelphia Inquirer hailed Andrew Pham?s debut, Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam, for evoking ?the full sadness of the human condition . . . marveling at spiritual resilience amid irreconcilable facts.? The New York Times Book Review called it, simply, ?remarkable.? Now, in The Eaves of Heaven, Pham gives voice to his father?s unique experience in an unforgettable story of war and remembrance.
Once wealthy landowners, Thong Van Pham?s family was shattered by the tumultuous events of the twentieth century: the festering French occupation of Indochina, the Japanese invasion during World War II, and the Vietnam War.
Told in dazzling chapters that alternate between events in the past and those closer to the present, The Eaves of Heaven brilliantly re-creates the trials of everyday life in Vietnam as endured by one man, from the fall of Hanoi and the collapse of French colonialism to the frenzied evacuation of Saigon. Pham offers a rare portal into a lost world as he chronicles Thong Van Pham?s heartbreaks, triumphs, and bizarre reversals of fortune, whether as a South Vietnamese soldier pinned down by enemy fire, a prisoner of the North Vietnamese under brutal interrogation, or a refugee desperately trying to escape Vietnam after the last American helicopter has abandoned Saigon. This is the story of a man caught in the maelstrom of twentieth-century politics, a gripping memoir told with the urgency of a wartime dispatch by a writer of surpassing talent.
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| Customer Reviews:
 The Eves of Heaven August 10, 2008
`The Eves of Heaven` is an "auto-biography" by Thong Van Pham. In fact it is written by his son Andrew, but he takes on the first person voice of his father Thong, similar to the technique used by Dave Eggers in `What Is the What?`. It is difficult to know how accurate it is, or what degree of artistic license is involved, but in a way it doesn't matter because as creative non-fiction it reads like a novel.
Not only is the story highly engrossing, thrilling and fascinating, but it is humane. Thong never seems to loose his sense of dignity and respect for life despite the horrors of violence, drugs and prostitution that stalk him. The lush prose is deliciously sensuous in one chapter, then shifts to scenes of deprivation the next, like a master chef playing the pallet between extremes of texture and temperature - and like the fusion of French and Asian culture that is Vietnam.
`The Eaves of Heaven` covers over 30 years of war in Vietnam as it transitioned from a "feudal" age to the modern world in one or two generations - the Japanese in WWII, the French and then the Americans. One mans lifetime saw it all from start to end. Through this wonderfully written, humane and moving memoir of a single life, I was better able to understand Vietnam, its people and its recent past.
 Provocative Page-turner July 28, 2008
Mr. Pham has done his father a great service. This book is something of a memoir written from the perspective of his father through the son's pen. This heart-rending story catalogues the trials, the horrors, and the injustices suffered by the average Vietnamese citizen at the hands of their political elite--on both sides Communists and Nationalists---and also provides insight into traditional family time---complete with "grasshopper" hunting and cricket fights among the children.
Mr. Pham "the Elder's" moral and physical courage in the face of friends joining one movement or another or physical danger is illustrative of a courageous and dedicated spirit.
Read the book in two sittings---and was completely enthralled by the style and content.
Highly recommended---I'm going to read Catfish and Mandala soon.
My favorite book of the Summer for story, language, emotion, and more July 14, 2008
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
Sometimes a reader is privileged enough to read a book in which the words, sentences, and stories just wash over and envelop you, like a gentle beach wave. This is such a book. I enjoyed Pham's earlier "Catfish" so much that I awaited this latest book of family stories with great anticipation; and I was rewarded. Whether I read this on the subway, a bench, or at home, I was immediately transported to Vietnam, where Pham skillfully describes the villages and cities, the triumphs, pains, tastes, loves, corruptions, kindnesses, terrors and fears of his father's early life (or perhaps lives.) Along the way, I learned more about Vietnamese history and village life than I ever knew before. Pham orders the chapters so that the reader moves back and forth between the decades of his father's childhood and adulthood, all the while progressing to the point we all expect, the fall of Saigon to the VC.
As his grandmother taught, the eaves of heaven dealt good and bad in cycles. Devastating floods brought death but fertile harvests, childbirths brought the risks of a mother's death, and lovely days brought future storms. The lyrical sentences allow you to nearly taste the peach melba ice cream eaten during a courtship, but also let you live the terror of re-education and being pinned down by VC troops in a life or death firefight. The pure childhood enjoyment of eating treats and having cricket fights is a pleasure to read. But one will never again care for the fabled glory of the French Foreign Legion after finishing this book. I finished the final chapter just as NBC began to telecast the Miss Universe pageant from a colorful and cosmopolitan Ho Chi Minh City and Nha Trang, and all I could do is ponder the tribulations of this memoir and the amnesia of the telecast. Luckily this book captures a forgotten past with all the aspects that the eaves leave in shadows.
fascinating biography that look at the history of Viet Nam June 28, 2008
4 out of 9 found this review helpful
From 1940 to1976, Viet Nam was in a constant state of war that impacted the people. Andrew X. Pham provides the biography of his father Thong Van Pham, who lived through the three plus decades of war starting with the Japanese invasion of the French occupied region during WW II through the fight for independent from the French and finally the war over the South against the United States. As a child Thong lived an upper crust life being born to a wealthy family. Over the years of war, famine and abuse, the family fortune vanished and consequently the life style.
This is a fascinating biography that also serves as a deep look at the history of Viet Nam. The author rotates his father's life with recent events that brings a harrowing feel as the reader gains a sense of the outcome resulting from the years of turbulence. Well written, readers will marvel at Mr. Pham's capture of the impact of power struggles on everyday people.
Harriet Klausner
Read! June 26, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
The Eaves of Heaven is about Thong Pham's life. His son, Andrew Pham, writes in the first person as if it were his father telling his story. In the introduction Andrew writes "I have lent his [Thong Pham's] life stories my words...The perspectives and sentiments within are his." Hence this book is Thing Pham's memoir, distilled as stories he told his son, and further distilled as Andrew Pham recounts them again.
Thong Pham witnessed the French occupation of Vietnam, the Japanese occupation during World War II and the American war after World War II ended. His story is one of migration that those displaced by war experience. First he moved from his ancestral land in the Red River Delta (North Vietnam) to Hanoi, and later to Saigon. Recounted are also times when work demands pulled him away from his home and family.
Each chapter recounts an event that as a collection bring out the idyllic life of a Vietnamese child born into aristocracy, the horrors of armed conflict, the helplessness of forced migration, the plight of serving in the armed forces, and the hardships of being captured by the enemy. With these backdrops, the narrative interweaves human actions (both base and noble) that give this book its soul. As a collection of family stories, this book is a treasure trove for the Pham family.
Pham's attention to detail effectively transports the reader "on location" so one can truly feel the rain, see the sunrise and appreciate the events are they unfold. The chapters are not in chronological order, and I found myself constantly referring to prior chapters and prior events to get a better understanding of which events had transpired, and which ones were to come. When I re-read the book, I'll read the chapters so the events narrated are in chronological order.
For those not familiar with Vietnamese history, Pham provides adequate background to help follow the political events that transpire in Thong's life. The Eaves of Heaven is more about human feelings and emotion than about the political turmoil that serves as its backdrop. One realizes that armed conflict and forced migration bring out the best and worst in all of us.
Armchair Interviews agrees.
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