Thi Bui

Graphic Memoir, 2017 |328 pages

I am disappointed in this graphic memoir, which took Thi Bui years and years to write.  It reads more as history than a memoir or an intimate story.  It does not have the heart of the graphic memoir I recently read, They Called Us Enemy by George Takei.  The Best We Could Do tells a special, unique, and complex story about the generations who preceded Thi and her siblings in Vietnam and the United States, and does not succeed at painting a broad-brush picture to help us better understand what it was like for other families emigrating from Vietnam after the fall of South Vietnam.  That being said, I am glad I persisted to the end.  The last third explains the concept of "boat people" and depicts the reality of the first few weeks after entering this country.  I also enjoyed the graphics .... rendered completely in black, white, and orange.

January 2022