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| Author: Bich Minh Nguyen
Publisher: Viking Adult
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
Buy Used: $1.12
You Save: $23.83 (96%)
New (43) Used (36) Collectible (3) from $1.12
Avg. Customer Rating:  18 reviews
Sales Rank: 194416
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 272
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.6 x 1.2
ISBN: 0670038326
Dewey Decimal Number: 977.45600495922092
EAN: 9780670038329
ASIN: 0670038326
Publication Date: February 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: Bayfront Books carefully selects the books it offers for sale on Amazon, and only includes those that are worthy of another read. While dust jackets may be missing and covers may show some damage, the contents are very readable... even in those books where previous owners had taken considerable notes or highlighting.
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| Customer Reviews:
 A touching memoir December 31, 2007
I'm reading this book at the moment and can honestly say I haven't enjoyed a memoir this much in a long time. It's delicate, honest and very kind. B.M.Nguyen isn't judging anyone, just shares her experience of growing up as an immigrant from Vietnam.
I recommend this book if you are in a bad mood, it lifts you up, gives you a new and wonderful perspective on life.
 Reflections of a spoiled child December 2, 2007
6 out of 13 found this review helpful
Nguyen's tale leaves a rather foul taste in the mouth. Growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in a fairly large mid-Western city (metro population of roughly 550,000) one would expect to find some expression of gratitude for the opportunities and sacrifices people made for the Nguyen family, but instead, pages are devoted to biting the hand that fed her. Why? She, the author, is obviously a product of her time, and apparently, many (most?) people of her generation are incredibly selfish and self-centered. This comes through loud and clear, page after page. Perhaps she is a product of "multi-culturalism" and feels she had some inherent right to the fruits of the labors of her neighbors. Who knows. For this reason alone, though, the book is interesting - as a sociological study.
It may be Nguyen's writing style, but one feels a lack of love by Nguyen for her step mother, Rosa. She came onto the scene very early after the family immigrated and served as the glue which held the family together. As a professional, educated woman, she probably gave Nguyen and her siblings numerous advantages which other immigrants never enjoyed.
Her tale has some interesting disconnects. Grand Rapids is an all-white city! Not! It has a large Black population, second only to Detroit, and the neighborhoods she claims to have lived in are heavily integrated, both then and now. I wonder if she knows why? Hint - it has something to do with the terminus of the "underground railway." The streets where she claims to have lived are not within walking distance of the school she claims to have attended, so I'm guessing she's taken some liberties with facts - for whatever reasons. In fact, her family was set up in a middle class part of town, and as her father prospered, they moved to increasingly more prosperous parts of town. Nothing wrong with this, but I wonder how she could not be aware of it.
Grand Rapids is also religiously quite diverse. While the Calvinist Dutch do have a large and looming presence, they are hardly the monolith you perceive from her writings. A large number of Polish Catholic immigrants settled in Grand Rapids a century ago; there are the usual numbers of English speaking denominations and German Lutherans as well. Most of Michigan, outside of Detroit, is decidedly conservative. Nguyen would have encountered the "Roll up the streets at 9 PM" attitude whether she lived in Kalamazoo, Benton Harbor, Muskegon, Traverse City or other city outside of metro Detroit.
The story itself is rather strangely told. We get a lot of childish detail from age 4 to the end of elementary school. I was expecting to learn about her secondary school years as well as college experience, but was left wanting. From elementary school, it jumps to her visit to Viet Nam and also the rather bizarre reconnecting with her mother, who lives in Massachusetts. Both events take place a decade later. Again, someone else paid for her trips and again, a sense of ingratitude prevails.
Interestingly, there are better written stories of the escape from Viet Nam. And while her family left under duress, Nguyen is apparently clueless to the trials and tribulations of those who left after the Communist takeover. Nguyen's family was not true "upper class" in Viet Nam, but they weren't poor farmers by any stretch. They were a family which enjoyed a certain amount of privilege in old Viet Nam and perhaps having to earn that again after immigrating to the USA has tainted Nguyen's vision of her youth.
 like no other novel I've read November 17, 2007
This book was very odd, in a word. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. It relied heavily on food and pop culture references, at times too heavily, but having grown up in the same time and region as its author I could relate. Otherwise I may not have enjoyed it quite as much. At times, it was very obvious that the author was drawing from her other previously written stories and essays while writing this book (something I guessed with ease, even before learning it to be true). But it kept me totally entertained and drawn in, I didn't want to put the book down...so I definitely recommend it.
candid memoir of 70-80's American food in the midwest September 11, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
"Stealing Buddha's Dinner" is as much Ms. Nguyen's story as it is mine. Ms. Nguyen reflects back on her childhood memories of TV commericials of Kool Aid, Carnation Instant Breakfast, and Hamburger Helper; her Dutch neighborhood of pork chops and shepard's pie; her grandmother's canh chua and bo xao voi hanh; and as if that wasn't enough, her stepmother Rosa's sopas. Throughout it all, Ms. Nguyen tries to find her identity in all these clashing cultures, desperately wanting to fit in, only to find solace in solitude, TV, and books. But perhaps the greatest mystery is what happened to her real mother.
It's truly a touching story of what it means to be an American with Asian eyes and black hair.
Is it more a problem of poverty or lack of substance? August 28, 2007
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
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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