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Life for ten-year-old Linh was hard enough during the years post Vietnam war, but to be separated from her mother during an attempt to escape Vietnam in 1979 was unimaginable.
With no knowledge of her mother and baby sister's whereabouts, or even whether they are still alive, she and her father and brother make a second attempt to escape.
Landing in a refugee camp, Linh is troubled when her father’s wedding ring disappears and he becomes good friends with another female refugee. What if her father decides he wants a new wife? What if they never reunite with her mother? She must act fast. Her family is dwindling right before her eyes.
"Linh's first-person narration is the manuscript's clear strength. [The] oscillation between magical thinking and ... domestic detail is where the book's emotional intelligence really lives.” — Mphuthumi Ntabeni, author of The Wanderers
Elli Que Vu is one of 1.5 million “boat people” who tried to escape Vietnam. She was one of the lucky ones to succeed. Water All Around, her debut novel, is loosely based on her own memories and experience. Through her book, she hopes others, including children, and the children’s children of immigrants, will come to understand the struggle during this period in history, and how/why so many people end up living in foreign lands. She hopes the novel, and her own personal story, will resonate with those who took similar paths and bring empathy to the plight of refugees.