Ghosts Return Unbidden

The collection opens with a story of a Vietnamese-American ghostwriter whose life is haunted—literally and figuratively—by the past. Her mother claims to see the ghost of her dead son, who drowned during their escape from Vietnam. The narrator, who has spent her life writing other people's stories, is forced to confront her own suppressed trauma and survivor's guilt. The ghost's visit is both a reckoning and a release, compelling her to remember the violence and sacrifice that allowed her to survive. Through this haunting, the story explores how the past refuses to stay buried, and how the living are shaped by the ghosts of those they have lost.

Names and Silences

Names, both given and withheld, become a motif for the ways refugees and immigrants navigate new worlds. The narrator's mother warns her about the dangers of being a writer, of putting one's name on things, and the family's history is marked by what is spoken and what is left silent. The act of ghostwriting—telling stories for others, erasing oneself—mirrors the larger experience of refugees, whose histories are often told by others or lost in translation. The silence around trauma, especially sexual violence and loss, is both a shield and a wound, passed down through generations.

New Lives, Old Shadows

Refugees arrive in America, carrying the weight of their pasts into unfamiliar landscapes. Liem, a young Vietnamese man, is sponsored by a gay couple in San Francisco. He navigates the complexities of sexuality, cultural difference, and longing for home, all while trying to fit into a world that is both liberating and alienating. The story captures the awkwardness of new beginnings, the search for belonging, and the subtle ways in which old traumas persist beneath the surface of daily life.

The Weight of Memory

Across the stories, characters are haunted by memories—of war, of family, of choices made and unmade. Whether it's the narrator's brother returning as a ghost, or Liem's struggle to reconcile his past with his present, memory is inescapable. The act of remembering is fraught: it can be a source of comfort, but also of pain and alienation. The stories ask what it means to remember, and whether forgetting is ever truly possible.

Family Divided, Family Remade

Families are split by war, migration, and personal choices. Some are reunited in unexpected ways, as in the story of a father with two sets of children—one in America, one in Vietnam—each named after the other. The awkwardness and longing of these reunions reveal the deep scars left by separation, and the ways in which family must be constantly renegotiated in exile. The desire for connection is powerful, but so too are the resentments and misunderstandings that distance creates.

The Cost of Belonging

Refugees and immigrants must navigate the pressures to assimilate, often at great personal cost. Whether it's the pressure to donate to anti-Communist causes in the Vietnamese community, or the need to hide one's sexuality or past, the price of belonging can be steep. The stories show how individuals and families are forced to make difficult choices—between safety and authenticity, between community and self.

Inheritance and Identity

The stories explore the inheritance of trauma, culture, and expectation. Children inherit not only their parents' hopes, but also their fears and regrets. The act of naming, the transmission of stories, and the burden of unspoken histories all shape the identities of the next generation. The question of what it means to be "good"—a good son, a good daughter, a good refugee—recurs throughout, often with no easy answers.

The Price of Survival

The stories do not shy away from the ethical ambiguities of survival. Whether it's a mother bribing a general's wife to save her husband, or a man accepting a liver transplant from a stranger, the act of surviving often requires choices that are morally fraught. The characters grapple with guilt, gratitude, and the knowledge that their survival may have come at the expense of others.

Love in Translation

Romantic and familial love are tested by migration, loss, and cultural difference. Relationships are strained by secrets, misunderstandings, and the inability to communicate across languages and experiences. The stories show how love can be both a source of strength and a site of pain, and how the longing for connection is often frustrated by the realities of exile.

The Past in the Present

The legacy of war and displacement is never far from the surface. Whether it's the threat of violence in the Vietnamese diaspora, the memory of lost homes, or the persistence of old rivalries, the past continually shapes the present. The stories reveal how history is not just something that happened, but something that is lived every day.

Fathers, Sons, and Secrets

The relationships between fathers and sons are marked by pride, disappointment, and unspoken expectations. Secrets—about infidelity, about the war, about personal failures—create distance and misunderstanding. The struggle to live up to or break free from a father's legacy is a recurring theme, as is the question of what it means to be a man in a new world.

The Burden of Gratitude

Characters wrestle with the expectation to be grateful—for survival, for opportunity, for the sacrifices of others. This gratitude is often complicated by resentment, guilt, and the sense that one can never repay what is owed. The stories probe the limits of gratitude, and the ways in which it can become a burden rather than a blessing.

The Unraveling Mind

In one story, a professor's mind is slowly unraveling due to dementia, and his wife must care for him as he forgets her name and confuses her with another woman. The loss of memory becomes a metaphor for the loss of home and identity, and the story is a moving meditation on love, duty, and the fear of being forgotten.

Home Is a Moving Target

For refugees, home is always provisional—something left behind, something sought, something recreated in exile. The stories explore the longing for home, the pain of displacement, and the ways in which home can be both a source of comfort and a site of loss. The search for home is ongoing, and often unfulfilled.

The Limits of Forgiveness

The stories do not offer easy resolutions. Characters struggle to forgive themselves and others—for betrayals, for failures, for the accidents of history. Forgiveness, when it comes, is partial and tentative, shadowed by the knowledge that some wounds never fully heal.

The Ashes of Hope

The collection ends with images of burning photographs, scattered ashes, and the recognition that some hopes must be relinquished. The act of letting go—of the past, of illusions, of impossible dreams—is both painful and necessary. Yet even as the characters mourn what is lost, there is a sense of resilience and the possibility of new beginnings.

Characters

The Ghostwriter (Narrator of "Black-Eyed Women")

The ghostwriter is a Vietnamese-American woman who has built her life around telling other people's stories while suppressing her own. Marked by survivor's guilt and the trauma of her brother's death during their escape, she is emotionally distant, childless, and deeply ambivalent about her place in the world. Her relationship with her mother is defined by both love and frustration, and her encounter with her brother's ghost forces her to confront the pain she has tried to forget. Her journey is one of reluctant remembrance and the search for meaning in the aftermath of loss.

The Mother (of the Ghostwriter)

The mother is a resilient, talkative woman who clings to the traditions and stories of the old country. She is both a source of comfort and a reminder of the past, insisting on the reality of ghosts and the importance of remembering. Her relationship with her daughter is marked by generational and cultural tension, but also by a deep, if unspoken, love. She represents the persistence of memory and the power of storytelling as a means of survival.

The Brother (Ghost)

The brother is both a literal ghost and a symbol of the past that cannot be laid to rest. His death is the central trauma of the narrator's life, and his return as a ghost is both a comfort and a challenge. He represents the unresolved grief and guilt that haunt survivors, and his presence forces the living to reckon with what has been lost and what remains unspoken.

Liem

Liem is a teenage Vietnamese refugee resettled in San Francisco with a gay couple. He is shy, observant, and caught between cultures, struggling with his sexuality and his sense of self. His relationships—with his sponsors, with his family back home, and with his own desires—are marked by uncertainty and longing. Liem's journey is one of self-discovery, as he learns to navigate love, identity, and the complexities of gratitude and obligation.

Parrish Coyne and Marcus Chan

Parrish and Marcus are Liem's sponsors, a gay couple whose relationship is both a source of fascination and anxiety for Liem. Parrish is older, nurturing, and idealistic, while Marcus is younger, more cynical, and emotionally guarded. Their dynamic offers Liem a glimpse of alternative ways of living and loving, but also highlights the challenges of intimacy and acceptance in a new world.

Arthur Arellano

Arthur is a Mexican-American man who receives a liver transplant from a Vietnamese donor. His life is marked by failure, regret, and a sense of inadequacy, both in his marriage and his career. The transplant becomes a metaphor for the ways in which lives are intertwined by chance and necessity, and Arthur's attempts to connect with his donor's family reveal the complexities of gratitude, identity, and moral compromise.

Louis Vu

Louis is a Vietnamese-Chinese entrepreneur who befriends Arthur under false pretenses, claiming to be the son of Arthur's liver donor. He is charming, opportunistic, and morally ambiguous, embodying the survival instincts and adaptability required in exile. His relationship with Arthur is both transactional and strangely intimate, exposing the blurred lines between friendship, exploitation, and the search for connection.

Mrs. Khanh and the Professor

Mrs. Khanh is the devoted wife of a retired professor whose mind is unraveling due to dementia. She is practical, loving, and fiercely protective, struggling to maintain her own identity as her husband forgets her name and confuses her with another woman. The professor, once a respected intellectual, is now vulnerable and dependent, his memories slipping away. Their relationship is a poignant exploration of love, duty, and the fear of being forgotten.

Mr. Ly, Phuong, and Vivien

Mr. Ly is a father with two sets of children—one in Vietnam, one in America—each named after the other. Phuong, his daughter in Vietnam, is ambitious and yearning for escape, while Vivien, her American half-sister, is burdened by expectations and her own failures. Their reunion is fraught with envy, misunderstanding, and the desire for recognition. The family's story encapsulates the pain of separation, the illusions of success, and the difficulty of bridging the gap between worlds.

Plot Devices

Ghosts and Hauntings

Ghosts appear throughout the collection, both literally and figuratively, representing the unresolved grief, guilt, and longing that haunt refugees and their descendants. The presence of ghosts blurs the line between past and present, the living and the dead, and serves as a powerful metaphor for the ways in which trauma persists across generations.

Doubling and Mirroring

Many stories feature characters who are doubled—siblings with the same name, families split by migration, lovers who reflect each other's fears and desires. This mirroring highlights the fragmentation of identity experienced by refugees, and the ways in which the self is constantly negotiated and remade in exile.

Letters and Storytelling

Letters, stories, and acts of writing recur as means of connection and miscommunication. The act of telling one's story is fraught with risk and possibility, offering both the chance for understanding and the danger of exposure. Storytelling becomes a way to preserve memory, assert identity, and bridge the gaps created by war and migration.

Objects as Symbols

Everyday objects—clothes, photographs, food, even a liver—take on symbolic weight, embodying the histories, hopes, and disappointments of their owners. The burning of photographs, the preservation of a wig, the inheritance of a name—all become acts of mourning and resistance, gestures toward making sense of a fractured world.

Nonlinear Narrative and Shifting Perspectives

The collection moves fluidly between past and present, between Vietnam and America, between different narrators and points of view. This structure mirrors the dislocation and multiplicity of the refugee experience, refusing easy closure and insisting on the complexity of memory and identity.

Analysis

**A meditation on displacement, memory, and the search for home, "The Refugees" is a masterful collection that illuminates the psychological and emotional costs of exile. Viet Thanh Nguyen's stories are united by their exploration of what it means to live between worlds—haunted by the past, uncertain of the future, and always negotiating the demands of family, community, and self. The book resists easy narratives of triumph or assimilation, instead offering a nuanced portrait of survival marked by loss, compromise, and resilience. In a world increasingly defined by migration and displacement, "The Refugees" speaks to the universal longing for belonging and the enduring power of stories to connect, heal, and bear witness. The collection's greatest lesson is that the past is never truly past, and that the work of making a home—within oneself, within a family, within a new country—is ongoing, unfinished, and deeply human.

Last updated: April 30, 2025