January 2022

This month's book club pick is On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong! We will be meeting on Friday, January 14th at 7:30 pm in an online video chat. You can RSVP and get the linkhere.

Ocean Vuong is the author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds and the New York Times bestselling novel On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous. A recipient of the 2019 MacArthur Genius Grant, he is also the winner of the Whiting Award and the T.S. Eliot Prize. His writings have been featured in The Atlantic, Harper's Magazine, The Nation, The New Republic, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Born in Saigon, Vietnam, he currently lives in Northampton, Massachusetts. You can find him on his website.
​

So, what's the book about?

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard.


With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.
​

via GIPHY

If this sounds like something you would like to read, you can get your copy of the book from the store for 15% off when you order with us: in store, online, over the phone (828.386.1219), or via email. Our booksellers will be happy to help you get the book in the format that you prefer! ​

Buy Online

Paperback
Audiobook
​E-book

​We are open to the public again (Mon-Sat from 11am-7pm) so you can pickup orders at the register. However, you can also pickup your book using our pickup basket at the front door or the drive thru window. We offer free media mail shipping for orders $30+ and free local delivery (within Boone town limits). Getting your book to you as conveniently as possible is important to us! 
 
Finally, you can RSVP on the Facebook event to get reminders & updates about any changes to the event! Do that here! You can also add it to your personal calendar - check out the event page to see our Google event calendar where you can RSVP!

Reviews & Interviews

On Earth is Gorgeous All the Way Through - NPR
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous Review - The Guardian
Survival as a Creative Force: An Interview with Ocean Vuong - The Paris Review
Ocean Vuong on reading, life during the pandemic, and xenophobia - The Seattle Times