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    On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel
    Unavailable
    On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel
    Unavailable
    On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel
    Audiobook7 hours

    On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel

    Published by Penguin Random House Audio

    4.5/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling.

    On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late 20s, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation.

    At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard.

    With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateJun 4, 2019
    ISBN9781984888846
    Unavailable
    On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel

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    Reviews for On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

    4.5/5

    77 ratings9 reviews

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    • 3/5
      There were moments when I audibly gasped at the beauty of the words and ideas, but it became a slog. I finished it, but almost wish I hadn’t: so I could continue imagining this book ended as strongly as i hoped it would. Great moments, but ultimately something of let down.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      The most beautiful open and honest piece of prose I have ever read...
    • 5/5
      Listening to this book was like hearing poetry. The author’s reading of the book made it extra special.
    • 5/5
      Wow. Just wow.
    • 5/5
      This is some of the most beautiful and moving language I've ever read.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      #OnEarthWereBrieflyGorgeous is a beautiful yet heartbreaking and raw poetic novel. There's a lot of truths covered here that most people tend to avoid confronting. Told in the form of a letter from Little Dog to his mother, the Vietnamese culture and effects from the war are eluded too often. Many of life's complexities are experienced by the narrator, from life to death and everything in between-- identity, growing up, race, gender, sexuality, aging, illness, drug addiction, poverty, love, family and so much more.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      My God, what a gift. What a gift this book is to all who breathe and know.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      This book has a slow buildup. It is not until you are in the thick of it that you realize that what is wonderful about it is not the just the plot, but also the prose itself.

      3 people found this helpful

    • 5/5
      The title says it all: this book is heartbreakingly gorgeous!

      2 people found this helpful