Kien Nguyen Quotes

Never had I beheld such despair. ~ Kien Nguyen

Hit me again, and I'll report you to the authorities. Follow me to my bed one more time, and I swear to the gods, I'll search for the most painful way to murder you. ~ Kien Nguyen

Lying half-asleep in his embrace, I looked up and saw on his face the same expression I saw on countless lonely faces every day. It was the homesick look of the children who were lost in the chaos of warfare, witnessing death and disaster, longing for a meaningful touch. ~ Kien Nguyen

I was scarcely aware of the angry hands scratching and pulling at me from all directions. Instead, I closed my eyes and wished silently for death to free me. ~ Kien Nguyen

It is difficult for me to commit to an manuscript. Once, I get finished writing it. I get this feeling of adrenaline, and satisfaction. This is when the amusement begins, for the writer's side of me. ~ Mary Sage Nguyen

Your problem isn't that you think too much; your problem is letting everyone know what you're thinking. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Freedom can be an acquired taste for those who have never savored it. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

give a woman the chance to reject something else besides me ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Blaming the ex for the breakup is like blaming the clothes for not fitting you. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

Because I grew up trapped in the suburbs 8 miles outside of D.C. and I've never seen what people who live in D.C. look like. ~ Thao Nguyen

Many people are afraid of diving deep into a relationship but they are also afraid of leaving it which leaves them in a relationship purgatory. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

All wars are fought twice, the first time on the battlefield, the second time in memory. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Isn't it funny that in a society that values freedom above all things, things that are free are not valued? ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Turn your back on the love you have for someone who has turned his back on you. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

Remember that the best medical treatment is a sense of relativism. No matter how badly you might feel, take comfort in knowing theres's someone who feels much worse. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

If you wait for the weekend to live,
you're not living 71% of your life. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

People always try to make self-published authors feel insignificant. I have more respect for self-published authors, because I know the adversity they faced. They didn't just write a manuscript, query letter, and blam book deal. These authors had to do it the difficult way. There is no publisher, or agents, investing time, and money into making their book. Just the indie author's manuscript, own currency, and persistence. ~ Mary Sage Nguyen

Unlike many, I was not intent on reproducing myself, deliberately or accidentally, since one of myself was more than enough for me to handle. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

In Hawaii, many were especially helpful and supportive of this project, but nobody more than Mary Kennedy and Frank "Bamboo" Opperman. My landlords became close friends, and their Mokuleia compound will always hold a special place in my heart. Mokuleia equestrian Michael Daly was also extremely helpful to both Mike Ritter and myself. Another special thanks goes to Duc Nguyen and Minh Nga Vu, the proprietors of Duc's Bistro. The restaurant provided a safe harbor at a very tumultuous time in the project. Their generosity, grace, and delicious ~ Peter Maguire

I feared death and I loved life. I yearned to live long enough to smoke one more cigarette, drink one more drink, experience seven more seconds of obscene bliss, and then, perhaps, but most likely not, I could die. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Obedience to God's Word acts on our faith as fire refines gold and silver and increases our confidence and trust in God and Jesus. ~ Dallied Kien

If youth was not wasted, how could it be youth? ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Courage and strength moves like the steadfast waves of the ocean. Ebbs and flows, highs and lows, loud and soft, firm and vulnerable, passing encouragement from one generation to the next. ~ Lynda Nguyen

Oh, fish sauce! How we missed it, dear Aunt, how nothing tasted right without it, how we longed for the grand cru of Phu Quoc Island and its vats brimming with the finest vintage of pressed anchovies! This pungent liquid condiment of the darkest sepia hue was much denigrated by foreigners for its supposedly horrendous reek, lending new meaning to the phrase "there's something fishy aroud here," for we were the fishy ones. We used fish sauce the way Transylvanian villagers were cloves of garlic to ward off vampires, in our case to establish a perimeter with those Westerners who could never understand that was truly fishy was the nauseating stench of cheese. What was fermented fish compared to curdled milk? ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

The word that identified what we did not possess was "money," . . . The other word was "votes," so that together "money votes" was "open sesame" to the deep caverns of the American political system. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Telling what must not be told is one of the writer's primary tasks. It is also a difficult and dangerous one. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

I looked back all the time, too much, too often. Like Rose, I would be circling my mother the rest of my life. ~ Bich Minh Nguyen

At the blind date,
deafen your ears
to hear the words
spoken with her eyes. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

Start a rumor about
peace taking over,
love being the new black,
and compassion going viral. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

Emotional scars run deeper than the Nile
and often lie lurking behind a smile. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

A great work of art is something as real as reality itself, and sometimes even more real than the real. Long after this war is forgotten, when its existence is a paragraph in a schoolbook students won't even bother to read, and everyone who survived it is dead, their bodies dust, their memories atom, their emotions no longer in motion, this work of art will still shine so brightly it will not just be about the war but it will be the war. (178) ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

A slogan is just an empty suit, she said. Anyone can wear it. I ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

No more than two opinions or ideas on any one issue should be out there, the General said. Look at the voting system. Same concept. We had multiple parties and candidates and look at the mess we had. Here you choose the left hand or the right and that's more than enough. Two choices and look at all the drama with every presidential election. Even two choices may be one too many. One choice is enough, and no choice may be even better. Less ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen

Venice smiled with extreme pleasure. She would never be the virtuous woman, her mother wanted her to be. She would never capitulate to society. After all their regulations were meant to be broken. ~ Mary Sage Nguyen

My task was to ensure that the people scuttling in the background of the film would be real Vietnamese things and dressed in real Vietnamese clothing, right before they died. ~ Viet Thanh Nguyen