On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous - Ocean Vuong - 2019
By: Ocean Vuong
Narrated by: Ocean Vuong
Length: 7 hrs and 19 mins
Unabridged Audiobook
Release date: 06-04-19
Categories: Literature & Fiction, Historical Fiction, Asian American, LGBTQ+
Language: English
Publisher: Penguin Audio
Format: mp3 64/48 stereo
An instant New York Times Best Seller!
Longlisted for the 2019 National Book Award for Fiction, the Carnegie Medal in Fiction, the 2019 Aspen Words Literacy Prize, and the PEN/Hemingway Debut Novel Award
Shortlisted for the 2019 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize Winner of the 2019 New England Book Award for Fiction!
Named one of the most anticipated books of 2019 by Vulture, Entertainment Weekly, Buzzfeed, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Oprah.com, Huffington Post, The A.V. Club, Nylon, The Week, The Rumpus, The Millions, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly, and more.
“A lyrical work of self-discovery that’s shockingly intimate and insistently universal…Not so much briefly gorgeous as permanently stunning.” (Ron Charles, The Washington Post)
Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling.
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 20s, 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.
Named a Best Book of the Year by: GQ, Kirkus Reviews, Booklist, Library Journal, Time, Esquire, The Washington Post, Apple, Good Housekeeping, The New Yorker, The New York Public Library, Elle.com, The Guardian, The A.V. Club, NPR, Lithub, Entertainment Weekly, Vogue.com, The San Francisco Chronicle, Mother Jones, Vanity Fair, The Wall Street Journal Magazine, and more!
©2019 Ocean Vuong (P)2019 Penguin Audio
Critic Reviews
“Vuong writes about the yearning for connection that afflicts immigrants. But ‘ocean’ also describes the distinctive way Vuong writes: His words are liquid, flowing, rolling, teasing, mighty and overpowering. When Vuong’s mother gave him the oh-so-apt name of Ocean, she inadvertently called into being a writer whose language some of us readers could happily drown in.... Like so many immigrant writers before him, Vuong has taken the English he acquired with difficulty and not only made it his own - he’s made it better.” (Maureen Corrigan, Fresh Air)
“In order to survive, Little Dog has to receive and reject another kind of violence, too: he must see his mother through the American eyes that scan her for weakness and incompetence and, at best, disregard her, the way that evil spirits might ignore a child named for a little dog. There is a staggering tenderness in the way that Little Dog holds all of this within himself, absorbing it and refusing to pass it on. Reading On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous can feel like watching an act of endurance art, or a slow, strange piece of magic in which bones become sonatas, to borrow one of Vuong’s metaphors.” (Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker)
“A bruised, breathtaking love letter never meant to be sent. A powerful testimony to magic and loss. A marvel.” (Marlon James, author of Black Leopard, Red Wolf)
“This book - gorgeous is right there in the title - finds incredible, aching beauty in the deep observation of love in many forms. Ocean Vuong's debut novel contains all the power of his poetry, and I finished the book knowing that we are seeing only the very beginning of his truly magnificent talent.” (Emma Straub, author of Modern Lovers and The Vacationers)
Editor's Pick
The most powerful listen of the year so far
"I don’t even really know where to begin in describing how much I loved this one. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is Ocean Vuong’s debut novel, and to call it anything short of "stunning" would be an understatement. Vuong is a master of language, and it's obvious when listening to this how much thought and care went into crafting every sentence of this story. This novel, written as a letter from a son to his mother, will break your heart, and there’s no way around it. And since the author himself narrates, you get to experience the enthralling atmosphere that is his voice. I feel confident that when we look back on our favorite listens of the year, this will be a top contender."
—Aaron S., Audible Editor
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