Thao Thai – författare

A sweeping, evocative debut novel following three generations of Vietnamese American women reeling from the death of their matriarch, revealing the family’s inherited burdens, buried secrets, and unlikely love stories. When Ann Tran gets the call that her fiercely beloved grandmother, Minh, has passed away, her life is already at a crossroads. In the years since she’s last seen Minh, Ann has built a seemingly perfect life—a beautiful lake house, a charming professor boyfriend, and invites to elegant parties that bubble over with champagne and good taste—but it all crumbles with one positive pregnancy test. With both her relationship and carefully planned future now in question, Ann returns home to Florida to face her estranged mother, Huơng.Back in Florida, Huơng is simultaneously mourning her mother and resenting her for having the relationship with Ann that she never did. Then Ann and Huơng learn that Minh has left them both the Banyan House, the crumbling old manor that was Ann’s childhood home, in all its strange, Gothic glory. Under the same roof for the first time in years, mother and daughter must face the simmering questions of their past and their uncertain futures, while trying to rebuild their relationship without the one person who’s always held them together.Running parallel to this is Minh’s story, as she goes from a lovestruck teenager living in the shadow of the Vietnam War to a determined young mother immigrating to America in search of a better life for her children. And when Ann makes a shocking discovery in the Banyan House’s attic, long-buried secrets come to light as it becomes clear how decisions Minh made in her youth affected the rest of her life—and beyond.Spanning decades and continents, from 1960s Vietnam to the wild swamplands of the Florida coast, Banyan Moon is a stunning and deeply moving story of mothers and daughters, the things we inherit, and the lives we choose to make out of that inheritance.

The perfect book club read FOR FANS OF CELESTE NG and MIN JIN LEE.'A riveting mother-daughter tale' Elle'Spellbinding and intricately layered' E.M. Tran'A gripping tale about motherhood' Heat'This novel has everything you want' Meng Jin 'A haunting page turner' Carolyn Huynh'Heart-shatteringly beautiful' Nguyen Phan Que MaiAnn Tran is already at a crossroads when she gets the call that her beloved grandmother, Minh, has died. With a beautiful home and a charming boyfriend, Ann has built a seemingly perfect life, but it all crumbles away with one positive pregnancy test.With her carefully planned future now in question, Ann returns home to Florida to face her estranged mother, Hu'o'ng. Under the same roof for the first time in years, mother and daughter must face the simmering questions of their past, without the one person who's always held them together.Running parallel to this is Minh's story, as she goes from a lovestruck teenager living in the shadow of the Vietnam War to a determined young mother immigrating to America in search of a better life. And when Ann makes a shocking discovery in the Banyan House's attic, long-buried secrets come to light.Spanning decades and continents, from 1960s Vietnam to the wild swamplands of the Florida coast, Banyan Moon is a stunning and deeply moving story of mothers and daughters, the things we inherit, and the lives we choose to make out of that inheritance.

TWO SISTERS. ONE PAINTING. A LONG-LOST SECRET.From the bestselling author of Banyan Moon comes a captivating, evocative story of two estranged sisters on a quest to find a painting by a forgotten Vietnamese artist that holds the truth of their family's fractured past.'Beautiful . . . a kind of ghost story wound through with artistic passion, a legacy of violence, and the indelible intimacy of sisterhood' Catherine Newman, New York Times bestselling author of Sandwich'The most achingly beautiful novel I've read in a long time' Amy Jo Burns, author of Wait For MeAside from the fact they are sisters, Vivi and Calla Nguyễn have little in common.Vivi, the eldest, lives an orderly and predictable life. She works as an art conservator at a museum in Chicago, carefully preserving pieces of the past, all the while refusing to examine her own dark history. Calla leads a much bolder, if occasionally reckless, existence. She's an accomplished artist with a flair for the dramatic, charming and intriguing everyone she meets. She's also a recovering addict, constantly causing Vivi to worry.Months after the two fall out in the wake of their father's death, Calla appears on the steps of the museum with a sketch and a letter she found in their father's belongings. The sketch is an exact copy of Blue Mirror, a striking painting by a Surrealist Vietnamese painter named K.P. Lý. In the letter, Lý writes about a mysterious lost work of art. Calla is convinced it is meant for their family, and that it was their father's deathbed wish for her and Vivi to find it together. Intrigued yet reluctant to follow her capricious sister, Vivi must decide whether she's willing to face or shut the door to the past.From the ghostly Wisconsin woods to a glittering estate in the French countryside to a disintegrating ancestral home teetering on the edge of a ravine in Việt Nam, The Seekers of Deer Creek is a story of sisters, art, and the irresistible gravity of the past-how it endures across time and generations, always present even when buriedPRAISE FOR THAO THAI'Thao Thai is a major talent' Nguyen Phan Que Mai, author of The Mountains Sing'Riveting . . . Magnetic' Elle, Best Books of 2023'Beautifully written . . . a joy to read' Christina Baker Kline, author of The Exiles'Haunting, a little spooky and occasionally heartbreaking' Good Housekeeping, Best Books of 2023