Something his own first book manages to achieve here. Immersing himself in great literature in high school provides a “connective and humanizing resonance,” 87.2K subscribers Subscribe 2.1K views 2 years ago In 1975, during the fall of Saigon, Phuc Tran immigrates to America along with his family. To survive, he “tried to erase otherness, Asianness, with an assimilation-an Americanization” that flaunted academic excellence and “Operation Look Punk” (“one way to show you fit in? By not fitting in”). Tran’s debut memoir, Sigh, Gone: A Misfit’s Memoir of Great Books, Punk Rock, and the Fight to Fit In, recounts in stunning detail his coming of age in white, small-town America.

Collar blue.” Arriving as a two-year-old refugee in 1975 with his parents, grandparents, and other extended family-his younger brother Louis would be born a year later-Tran grew into an awkward child, realizing early “e weren’t like everybody else.” He spent 11 years “clawing way to acceptance,” enduring bullying at school, emotional and physical abuse at home. Great works aside, going aural is your recommended medium because Tran also makes his narrating debut-prefaced by an actual drumroll, yes!-with energy, empathy, and plenty of curse words, as he shares his no-holds-barred coming-of-age journey in small-town Carlisle, Pennsylvania: “Poorly read. Books, indeed, guide debut author Tran’s life, especially as a Vietnamese American teenager desperate to feel he belongs. This is a reflective coming-of-age journey about Phuc Tran of displacement and assimilation after he immigrates to America, escaping from Saigon. SIGH, GONE A Misfit's Memoir of Great Books, Punk Rock, and the Fight to Fit In Phuc Tran For anyone who has ever felt like they don’t belong, Sigh, Gone shares an irreverent, funny, and moving tale of displacement and assimilation woven together with poignant themes from beloved works of classic literature. What you might miss if you opt for the audiobook is a rather unexpected table of contents page, on which every chapter title is a (Western) literary classic, from The Picture of Dorian Gray to The Iliad.

Sigh gone phuc tran