The Refugees

The Refugees is a 2017 collection of short stories by celebrated Vietnamese American author, Viet Thanh Nguyen. Nguyen has written fiction, academic nonfiction, and children’s books, and his novel The Sympathizer won the Pulitzer Prize in 2016. Nguyen received his doctorate in English at the University of California Berkeley, and he currently is a literature professor at the University of Southern California. Nguyen’s scholarship and literary works focus on the experiences of Vietnamese communities in the United States. The Refugees deals with themes of intergenerational conflict, otherness, and trauma in Vietnamese diasporic communities following the Vietnam War. The book received positive reviews, was listed on several 2017 best book lists, and won the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association Honor Award.

Content Warning: Some stories in this collection depict sexual acts, violence, sexual violence, and instances of racism/racial prejudice.

This guide refers to the Barnes and Noble Nook eBook edition of The Refugees.

Plot Summary

The Refugees consists of eight short stories and two essays.

In “Black-Eyed Women,” the unnamed protagonist is a ghostwriter living with her mother. They are visited by the ghost of her older brother, who died defending the protagonist from pirates as the family crossed the ocean as refugees from the Vietnam War.