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inlaraland's review
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
(4.5/5 stars)
Reading this book feels like you're floating out in the water, and you never know when a current might pull you in. The timeline moves backwards from present to past, giving you only a brief perspective on the experiences that the characters face during certain periods of their life.
Daughters of the New Year is a story about generational trauma, immigrants, cultural detachment, fading memories, and the fate of horoscopes. Told through the perspective of mothers and daughters from different generations, you see how each of their experiences shape their decisions, and inevitably how those factors influence their relationships with one another as time goes by.
I wish this book was longer - I wish I had more answers about the lives of the characters who grew dear to my heart, but I think the lack of closure mirrors one of the many messages in this novel. This book forces you to be empathetic, to find a space in understanding characters who are neither good or bad, but a very human gray. The plot isn't quite linear, so if you're looking for a traditionally structured story then this might not be for you as reading each part about the characters almost feels like a personal investigation into their lives.
However, I will say that this story is a small seed of Vietnam's complex history, and does a great job at highlighting how that very seed spreads its roots from one generation to the next.
If you enjoyed reading "The Mountain Sings" and "Of Women & Salt" then I would give this a try!
Reading this book feels like you're floating out in the water, and you never know when a current might pull you in. The timeline moves backwards from present to past, giving you only a brief perspective on the experiences that the characters face during certain periods of their life.
Daughters of the New Year is a story about generational trauma, immigrants, cultural detachment, fading memories, and the fate of horoscopes. Told through the perspective of mothers and daughters from different generations, you see how each of their experiences shape their decisions, and inevitably how those factors influence their relationships with one another as time goes by.
I wish this book was longer - I wish I had more answers about the lives of the characters who grew dear to my heart, but I think the lack of closure mirrors one of the many messages in this novel. This book forces you to be empathetic, to find a space in understanding characters who are neither good or bad, but a very human gray. The plot isn't quite linear, so if you're looking for a traditionally structured story then this might not be for you as reading each part about the characters almost feels like a personal investigation into their lives.
However, I will say that this story is a small seed of Vietnam's complex history, and does a great job at highlighting how that very seed spreads its roots from one generation to the next.
If you enjoyed reading "The Mountain Sings" and "Of Women & Salt" then I would give this a try!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism, Sexual assault, Racial slurs, Misogyny, Emotional abuse, and War
el21's review against another edition
emotional
informative
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This book was so difficult for me to finish. It took me a while to understand how the story was set up, as it’s told from many different short stories from women in one family going back in time. In the end, I did come to appreciate the form and story that was told, but would not read it again.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence, Sexual violence, Racism, War, Xenophobia, Sexual harassment, and Rape
metawish's review
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
While the book might be about a Vietnamese American family's experience, anyone who has immigrant parents will see themselves here. The author delves into how families work and how our histories change the context of our actions, humanizing parents and children alike. The author also experiments with time in the plot, an experiment I find successful in revealing information and moving the plot forward.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death of parent, War, Emotional abuse, Medical content, Animal death, Bullying, Sexual assault, and Murder
Minor: Rape
astraeal's review
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
moving backward in time is a cool concept EXCEPT the chapters all kinda ended abruptly, sometimes in the middle of something big, and that just left me frustrated that i will never know what happened next, how this plot for this character ended.
i did like how we were discovering more and more about the women of the family, uncovering layer after layer
i did like how we were discovering more and more about the women of the family, uncovering layer after layer
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Bullying, and Adult/minor relationship
Moderate: War, Death, Sexual assault, Blood, and Colonisation
akincses1992's review
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Wonderful and beautifully written. Highlights complicated mother-daughter relationships and the struggle of immigrants. Just a great read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying
Moderate: Murder, Xenophobia, Violence, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and War
Minor: Colonisation and Rape
graceesford's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
hopeful
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Colonisation, Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, Racism, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, Death, Racial slurs, and War
Minor: Rape
albon's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism, Misogyny, and Infidelity
Minor: War
wenwanzhao's review
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
I’m always intrigued by books that have an non-chronological timeline, and the backwards nature of Daughters of the New Year definitely felt important to the story that was being told. The more we went back in time, the more I felt like the book was moving away from our reality, which was a bit trippy but not un-enjoyable.
The immigrant child anecdotes in this story can seem a bit tiresome at times, but it seems unfair to blame someone for retelling an honest experience. The book thrives in its second part, where we delve into the ancestors of the characters we are originally introduced to. It’s fascinating to see how the present we are introduced to comes into play.
I admit to expecting more closure on the arcs of the three sisters centred in the blurb, but I suppose it’s just more reason to never trust a summary written by a publisher. Tran’s writing is evocative without being overbearing, and it kept me more hooked into a book than I have been in a while.
The immigrant child anecdotes in this story can seem a bit tiresome at times, but it seems unfair to blame someone for retelling an honest experience. The book thrives in its second part, where we delve into the ancestors of the characters we are originally introduced to. It’s fascinating to see how the present we are introduced to comes into play.
I admit to expecting more closure on the arcs of the three sisters centred in the blurb, but I suppose it’s just more reason to never trust a summary written by a publisher. Tran’s writing is evocative without being overbearing, and it kept me more hooked into a book than I have been in a while.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Sexual harassment, Rape, Pregnancy, Murder, Death of parent, War, Racism, and Death
musubi_mumma's review
adventurous
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
I am a sucker for a slow, immersive, multi-generational historical fiction. I love the unwinding of family secrets and histories. Families are spaces of ordinary and extraordinary trauma; intense love also breeds intense regret, jealousies, animosities. Tragedy binds and creates familial bonds stronger than blood. And, of course, as a historian I love getting a glimpse into a past where the reasons and logics behind piety, duty, and love are complex, sometimes contradictory, colored with personal suffering, traditions, and the institutions of humanity-at-large — as in this case, French colonialism and Confucian patriarchy.
That is the hinge around which Daughters of the New Year swivels. This novel is an honest portrait of the brutal historical and cultural complexities that shape familial love.
The reader is given a privileged view into the minds, hearts, and philosophies of several generations of Vietnamese women. It is a novel about why and how mothering, motherhood, and filial duty are never straightforward, why these acts of love are volatile constructions of history and culture. Time and place alter the modes by which we care for one another, show each other love. What is an expression of affection for one generation is manipulation to the next. What is piety to one generation is an empty gesture for another. The reasons why mothers do what they do, why sometimes their love crushes their daughters, are molded by forces beyond their control: war, racism, patriarchy. Yet, for all those differences, there is one motivation behind these acts: the desire to provide the next generation with more than what the previous had. This is the love embedded in families.
The reader is given a privileged view of an excavation of familial love through Vietnamese and American history. Through chapters narrated by a daughter of this family, daughters descended through a matriarchal bloodline, the reader gets an interior view of the characters’ minds. Each of them has a different voice in this novel. EM. Tran’s prose is a beautiful thread throughout, binding their stories together, but each of the characters speak with their own, unique voice. Each chapter reveals its narrator’s logic, their historical context; explains why they did the things they did — even perhaps knowing that those acts would somehow traumatize the next generation.
There is Nhi and her sisters, the American generation. There is their mother, Xuan; their aunt, Xuan’s sister; there is their grandmother; a line of women, as if holding hands, unbroken, their spirits resiliently swaying in the winds of change and time going all the way back to the epic and legendary Trung sisters. Daughters of the New Year is about these women.
Fans of Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing, Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club, or Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko will enjoy Tran’s Daughters of the New Year.
That is the hinge around which Daughters of the New Year swivels. This novel is an honest portrait of the brutal historical and cultural complexities that shape familial love.
The reader is given a privileged view into the minds, hearts, and philosophies of several generations of Vietnamese women. It is a novel about why and how mothering, motherhood, and filial duty are never straightforward, why these acts of love are volatile constructions of history and culture. Time and place alter the modes by which we care for one another, show each other love. What is an expression of affection for one generation is manipulation to the next. What is piety to one generation is an empty gesture for another. The reasons why mothers do what they do, why sometimes their love crushes their daughters, are molded by forces beyond their control: war, racism, patriarchy. Yet, for all those differences, there is one motivation behind these acts: the desire to provide the next generation with more than what the previous had. This is the love embedded in families.
The reader is given a privileged view of an excavation of familial love through Vietnamese and American history. Through chapters narrated by a daughter of this family, daughters descended through a matriarchal bloodline, the reader gets an interior view of the characters’ minds. Each of them has a different voice in this novel. EM. Tran’s prose is a beautiful thread throughout, binding their stories together, but each of the characters speak with their own, unique voice. Each chapter reveals its narrator’s logic, their historical context; explains why they did the things they did — even perhaps knowing that those acts would somehow traumatize the next generation.
There is Nhi and her sisters, the American generation. There is their mother, Xuan; their aunt, Xuan’s sister; there is their grandmother; a line of women, as if holding hands, unbroken, their spirits resiliently swaying in the winds of change and time going all the way back to the epic and legendary Trung sisters. Daughters of the New Year is about these women.
Fans of Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing, Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club, or Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko will enjoy Tran’s Daughters of the New Year.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Fatphobia, Adult/minor relationship, Classism, Colonisation, Death of parent, Racism, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and War
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