''Ru'' is a novel by Vietnamese-born

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

novelist Kim Thúy, first published in French in 2009 by

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

publisher Libre Expression. It was translated into English in 2012 by

Sheila Fischman Sheila Leah Fischman (born 1 December 1937) is a Canadian translator who specializes in the translation of works of contemporary Quebec literature from French to English. Born in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, she was brought up in Ontario. She hold ...

and published by

Vintage Canada Random House of Canada was the Canadian distributor for Random House, Inc. from 1944 until 2013. On July 1, 2013, it amalgamated with Penguin Canada to become Penguin Random House Canada. Company history Random House of Canada was established i ...

Plot summary

The novel tells the tale of a woman, An Tinh Nguyen, born in Saigon in 1968 during the

Tet Offensive The Tet Offensive was a major escalation and one of the largest military campaigns of the Vietnam War. It was launched on January 30, 1968 by forces of the Viet Cong (VC) and North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) against the force ...

who immigrates to Canada with her family as a child. The book switches between her childhood in Vietnam where she was born into a large and wealthy family, her time as a boat person when she left her country for a refugee camp in

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, and her life as an early immigrant in

Granby, Quebec Granby is a town in southwestern Quebec, located east of Montreal. The population as of the Canada 2021 Census was 69,025. Granby is the seat of La Haute-Yamaska Regional County Municipality. It is the second most populated city in Estrie afte ...

. The story is told by a first-person narrative.

Title

The word ru has significance in both French and Vietnamese. In French, the word means stream or flow of money, tears or blood. In Vietnamese, the word means cradle or lullaby.

About

Kim Thúy wrote the book in honor of the people who welcomed her and her family into their life when they first arrived. War, migration, and resettlement are themes that reoccur throughout the novel.

Style

Ru is read like an autobiography but is written as the fictional tale of migrant experiences. The style of the book has been described as being an auto-fiction. The book tells the story of the first wave of

Boat People Vietnamese boat people ( vi, Thuyền nhân Việt Nam), also known simply as boat people, refers to the refugees who fled Vietnam by boat and ship following the end of the Vietnam War in 1975. This migration and humanitarian crisis was at its h ...

who fled Vietnam between 1977 and 1979 and the trauma they lived through, taking the reader on their journey. It is estimated that more than 200,000 boat people fled, many of which drowned. The novel is written in 144 unnumbered vignettes, that share the memories of the protagonist in three completely different environments: Her childhood home in Vietnam, a refugee camp in Malaysia, and the town of Granby in Quebec, Canada. The style of writing resembles memories shared by the narrator, which are woven together to create a narrative. The characters included in the novel are the narrator's family members, both immediate and extended, as well as friends and individuals whom she encountered along her journey. The family members of the narrator are not given names, but rather given numbers. By having nameless characters, the author depersonalizes them and leaves room for interpretation.

Awards and nominations

The original French edition of the novel was selected for the 2014 edition of '' Le Combat des livres'', where it was defended by author and physician Jean-François Chicoine. Its English translation was selected for the 2015 edition of ''

Canada Reads ''Canada Reads'' is an annual "battle of the books" competition organized and broadcast by Canada's public broadcaster, the CBC. The program has aired in two distinct editions, the English-language ''Canada Reads'' on CBC Radio One, and the Frenc ...

'' by film critic and

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a perman ...

programmer Cameron Bailey, and won the competition on March 19, 2015. The English edition, translated by

, was published in 2012 by

Random House Canada Random House of Canada was the Canadian distributor for Random House, Inc. from 1944 until 2013. On July 1, 2013, it amalgamated with Penguin Canada to become Penguin Random House Canada. Company history Random House of Canada was established in ...

and was a shortlisted nominee for the 2012

Scotiabank Giller Prize The Giller Prize (sponsored as the Scotiabank Giller Prize), is a literary award given to a Canadian author of a novel or short story collection published in English (including translation) the previous year, after an annual juried competition be ...

, the 2012 Governor General's Award for French to English translation, and the 2013 Amazon.ca First Novel Award. *WINNER 2015 - Canada Reads *WINNER 2011 – Grand Prix littéraire Archambault *WINNER 2011 –

Mondello Prize The Mondello Prize (Italian: Premio Mondello or Premio letterario internazionale Mondello Città di Palermo) is an Italian literary award established in 1975. History The award was founded by a group of Palermo intellectuals and academics, and was ...

for Multiculturalism *WINNER 2010 – Prix du Grand Public Salon du livre––Essai/Livre pratique *WINNER 2010 – Governor General's Award for Fiction (French-language) *WINNER 2010 – Grand Prix RTL-Lire at the Salon du livre de Paris

Reception

Kim Thúy lives and works in Canada. However, the audience, discourse, and geographical locations in Ru are taken beyond the borders of Canada. The book has been published in Canada, both in English and French, as well as eighteen other countries. In an interview, Thúy describes the different perspective readers have depended on where they are from. She gives the example of people in Romania focusing on the communist regime described in the book, while people in France focused on the structure and the language used in the book. The book has been seen as controversial, especially in Vietnam where the author describes the communist history as still being recent and a sensitive topic. Thúy goes on to discuss that the history of the Boat People has not yet become part of Vietnam history. The novel Ru does not portray the communists in a completely negative perspective, which Thúy claims has caused controversy as a portion of the Vietnamese population blame them for the hardships their families endured.

References

{{reflist 2009 Canadian novels Vietnamese Canadian Canadian French-language novels