The Best We Could Do

The notion of birth is central to the idea of family. Both of these things are salient foci of The Best We Could Do. The narrative begins and ends with the birth of Thi’s son and documents numerous births within the Bui family—including Hắng’s stillbirth and the death of her first baby. Birth is the defining characteristic of a family for Bui: The act of creating one new life from two preexisting ones, and the struggle of nurturing that life so that it may enjoy a future, while grappling with the pain and trauma of the past, is what composes the life of a family. The idea of birth encapsulates past, present, and future, and is therefore an analog to the idea of family itself. Through this motif, Bui communicates the temporal and emotional complexity of the family as a unit. 

The motif of freedom recurs throughout the narrative, but it’s not freedom of a singular kind. The most prominent example of this motif is Thi’s feeling of unfreedom in her childhood, contrasted against her hope for the freedom of her son. The family’s refugee story is a journey toward freedom from war, danger, and suffering.