Andrew Lam: Stories From the Edge of the Sea

In the opening story, “She in a Dance of Frenzy,” the protagonist has sex with many men. In the second story, “Agape at the Guggenheim,” a gay Vietnamese-American meets his white lover at a museum. These two stories are short and lovely. The third story, “The Isle Is Full of Noises,” is much longer and I got lost. I skipped to the last story, “The Tree of Life,” in which the narrator talks about his mother and her strength to lift her family forward. “Swimming from the Mekong Delta” is told in a stand-up comedy routine through a voice of a comedian. In Stories From the Edge of the Sea, Andrew Lam weaves different stories together. Stories are sad, funny, and heartfelt, but they all carry the trauma of the past from the “Vietnam War.” I didn’t like this collection at first, but Lam’s writing grew on me and I enjoyed it.