Water: A Chronicle
At the heart of this watery ‘chronicle’ is a dual mystery: a holy man on an island empire, once a con artist, and a desperate mother named Phúc (Fortune) seeking his heart to cure her child. The mosaic novel of nine stories circles this enigma like the river’s currents, carrying with it fragments of myth and life from timeless Mekong. A trans woman who wants to be “full”, a shadow bride who wants to be fleshed, a mad woman with a colicky infant, a words-eating-woman shielding her child from a fly apocalypse…. The ghosts and ghouls that reflect upon the water surface may well be the everyday reality of river life, or simply the universal haunting of womanhood.
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by Nguyễn Ngọc Tư
Translated by Nguyễn An Lý
Edited by Deborah Smith
Winner of the PEN Translates Award 2024
At the heart of this watery ‘chronicle’ is a dual mystery: a holy man on an island empire, once a con artist, and a desperate mother named Phúc (Fortune) seeking his heart to cure her child. The mosaic novel of nine stories circles this enigma like the river’s currents, carrying with it fragments of myth and life from timeless Mekong. A trans woman who wants to be “full”, a shadow bride who wants to be fleshed, a mad woman with a colicky infant, a words-eating-woman shielding her child from a fly apocalypse…. The ghosts and ghouls that reflect upon the water surface may well be the everyday reality of river life, or simply the universal haunting of womanhood.