6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Ungrateful at Times, September 25, 2009
This review is from: Stealing Buddha's Dinner: A Memoir (Perfect Paperback)
I lived in Grand Rapids for about one year and I actually am familiar with the areas the author lived in. I had to laugh as she spoke about Princeton Estates as we lived in a home with that sign in our front lawn for a little over a year. It is now a very typical middle class neighborhood, nothing all that fancy. I felt the author was quite unkind in her descriptions of the Dutch people. They are a hard working group of people, who may come off a little abrupt and who are keen on watching their money. However, they sponsored many immigrant families, set them up with housing, jobs and sponsorships. I felt the author was unkind in her description of them and she came off sounding ungrateful and mean spirited. I am not Dutch but worked with many of them and they were extremely hard working and generous. I believe her isolation came more from her shyness and disfunctional family than from her ethnic background.
I found the book whiney. I grew up lower middle class, but my parents did what they could for us children. We never had store bought snacks, I never had hamburger helper until I was married and I never had a pair of jeans until college. Life goes on, I wanted jeans and a sweater when I was in junior high, didn't get them, but I didn't blame my family, neighbors and the entire town I lived in for not having them.
I kept thinking the author would realize that the life she had was far better than what many other people have. I do think in the last few chapters she was realizing this might be the case, but it was not enough to make up for all the previous boring, whining, endless food stories.
Lastly, I also did not like the fact the book jumped around - one chapter she would be five and then she would be eight and then back to five, etc. I found this confusing. I will say that it was interesting to read a story about a place you have actually lived in and can say - "I remember that store or that street or neighborhood."
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16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Is it more a problem of poverty or lack of substance?, August 28, 2007
This book is non-commital yet oddly angry and unsympathetic toward the narrator's kin: an ill-fitting immigrant step-mother, her ill-suited marraige and their whole patchwork family hold much potential for warmth and growth...but achieve none. Through the book I hoped for some grace, beauty or forgiveness - that the young narrator might find a connection to her family, her community or her nation(s).
At times there are glimpes of a connection, but in the end all of her self-pitiful assessments remain: her sisters were mean, father was distant, step-mother was an overly ambitious, class-confused control freak.
I'd hoped to learn that these fabulous, interesting people- her father, sisters, step-mother, and so-called friends (nothing more to her than ineffective stepping-stones to social success) actually had valid motives and had made valiant efforts, but in the end it was simple: they had not understood her and she had not understood them.
Most importantly, I learned that through her young life she'd been miserable. She'd wanted a lot of foods and other things she couldn't have, which was startlingly familiar to me because I was a kid at this time and I was poor too! I wanted all of those fabulous things like potato chips and soda-pop and barbie dolls, and I didn't get any of it either.
So perhaps this book is most eloquent as a story about growing up poor in America. Perhaps the difference between being a second generation immigrant and a fourth generation immigrant isn't so great as the difference between being poor and not being poor.
Or perhaps I read too much into this book, which may in fact just be about an angry girl who didn't know or get what she wanted.
If you're looking for an introduction into this time period and into an overlooked American population, or if you want an overview/example of the history and experience of Vietnamese/American refugee/immigrants, this is a good start...very simple and skimming the surface.
But for some really excellent and available Vietnamese literature, try "Novel without a Name" or "Paradise of the Blind" and for the Vietnamese-American experience, consider Le Ly Hayslip's "When Heaven & Earth Changed Places", for starters...for those who want to start with a little depth.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
lukewarm, June 12, 2008
This review is from: Stealing Buddha's Dinner: A Memoir (Perfect Paperback)
This book is just okay. There were a few insighful moments about acculturation and religion, but nothing really new in the ethnic-american and/or memoir genre. It's a nice collection of memories, especially if you grew up in the 1980's. However, it lacks good storytelling. Nothing really happens. I find it surprising that the author teaches literature and creative writing. Overall, disappointing.
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