My mother, the mermaid chaser

In this haunting sequel to My Father, the Panda Killer (rev. 9/23), readers are reacquainted with the complicated Vu family; this time the multilayered story focuses on one San Jose teen's life-changing Vietnam summer trip while revisiting hardships his estranged refugee mother experienced as a teen during the Vietnam War. Paul, sixteen, travels to Da Nang in 2008 with his abusive father to visit his paternal grandmother. Paul is initially ambivalent about the trip since his older sister, Jane (a protagonist in the first novel), bails, and he feels like an outsider. He eventually bonds with a distant cousin and meets his maternal grandmother. The teen then learns more about his mother, Ngoc Lan, who abandoned the family several years earlier. Alternating chapters from Ngoc Lan's point of view cover her own parental abandonment and wrenching sea evacuation, her older sister's drowning (the titular mermaid), and her struggles to establish a new life in California. Hoang's dramatic coming-of-age novel is an intense exploration of grief, loss, and multigenerational trauma that ultimately leads to understanding, forgiveness, and even love. Back matter includes a list of professional resources for people dealing with abuse and mental health issues. Michelle LeeNovember/December 2025 p.69 (c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Sixteen-year-old Paul spends a summer in Vietnam tracing the life of his long-absent mother, who was a wartime refugee. Back home in San Jose from Vietnam, Paul is ready to tell his skeptical sister, Jane, what he learned about their estranged mother, Ngọc Lan. Thirteen years ago, Ngọc Lan walked out on them and their father, causing trauma that Jane continues to process in therapy. It's 2008, nine years after the events ofMy Father, the Panda Killer (2023), when Jane was on the cusp of going to college, leaving Paul to contend with their abusive father alone. At that time, Jane recounted to Paul their father Phúc's raw, hyperreal tale of escape from Vietnam--a harrowing journey through pirate-infested, shark-filled waters. In this poignant companion novel that Hoang calls "history adjacent," Paul and Ngọc Lan's stories alternate, their family lore satisfyingly converging. The novel follows Paul as he explores Vietnam's vibrant streets, searching for clues to his mother's past. His journey sharply contrasts with Ngọc Lan's emotional departure from her homeland in 1975. The dual narratives are united through a guiding spirit that swims by "like a mermaid painted with undefined brushstrokes." Vietnamese superstitions and the complexities of knowing who's related to whom--and what to call them--form a humorous and informative backdrop, adding bright cultural insights that lighten the somber impact of war's profound grief. A haunting, compassionate tribute to the children of war. (content note, character guide, honorifics, resources, author's note)(Fiction. 13-18) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.