Author: Khanh Ha

Publisher:  Eastover Press LLC 

ISBN: 978-1958094020

Guaranteed to be the best book of short stories that you read all year! 

Khanh Ha's, All the Rivers Flow Into the Sea, is an incredibly touching, vividly intimate look at life in Vietnam during the Vietnam war. With short stories such as 'The Woman-Child' about a Vietnamese-American student who returns to the country of his birth to write his thesis on shrimp aquaculture.

While there, he befriends a young girl named Cam who lives with her fisherman father. The girl and her father struggle with extreme poverty, despite his occupation, and the student, Minh must come to terms with the fact that there is little he can do to help Cam. This story is a candid look at the living conditions of children due to the horrors of the war, and the differences that existed for a child who got out. 

Also in the collection, 'All the Pretty Horses,' a story that is told through the eyes of a young man who believes that he had a previous life as his parent's stillborn child. As an adult, the young man observes a growing relationship between his father and a Vietnamese teacher living in Washington D.C. A stunning look at the private lives of parents, and American/Vietnamese relations during the war, this story is as beautiful as it is tragic. 

The title story of the book, 'All the Rivers Flow Into The Sea,' concerns another Vietnamese/American couple, this time a young one living in Vietnam. The couple-- an American soldier and a young Vietnamese woman-- face challenges as they attempt to return to the woman's home and father. After a long journey that consists of a train ride, walking and rowing, the couple manages to make it home. But soon, tragedy strikes in the form of the woman's father being diagnosed with cancer. The young couple must face another challenge, and may not come out of it together. 

Khanh Ha’s poetic prose is hypnotizing.  Many of the stories are heavy so, I did find myself putting the book down between stories, to digest and contemplate what I read. Because of the subject matter and the need for contemplation, it would make an excellent book club read and I will be recommended it to my book club.  I have been a fan of Khanh Ha for many years now and this is another book that did not disappoint. I highly recommend ‘All the Rivers Flow Into the Sea’ to those who enjoy literary fiction, stories about Vietnam, and short stories.

About Khanh Ha

Multi award winning author, Khanh Ha is the author of Flesh, The Demon Who Peddled Longing, and Mrs. Rossi’s Dream. He is a seven-time Pushcart nominee, finalist for the Mary McCarthy Prize, Many Voices Project, Prairie Schooner Book Prize, and The University of New Orleans Press Lab Prize. He is the recipient of the Sand Hills Prize for Best Fiction, the Robert Watson Literary Prize in Fiction, The Orison Anthology Award for Fiction, The James Knudsen Prize for Fiction, The C&R Press Fiction Prize, and The EastOver Fiction Prize.

Mrs. Rossi’s Dream was named Best New Book by Booklist and a 2019 Foreword Reviews INDIES Silver Winner and Bronze Winner. All the Rivers Flow into the Sea & Other Stories has already won the EastOver Fiction Prize.