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Solving for the Unknown book cover
Solving for the Unknown
2025
First Published
3.70
Average Rating
333
Number of Pages

In this sweet, incredibly heartfelt companion to A Pho Love Story, Vietnamese Americans Viet and Evie juggle family expectations with their desire to forge their own path in between college classes and falling in love. To his friends back home, Viet Ho is calm and collected and a lovable oddball who nurses an obsession with forensic science. He’s relieved to head off to UC Davis and escape from being in the middle of his bickering immigrant parents. Yet, on campus and with the school year unfolding at an overwhelming pace, Viet struggles to belong and to keep his depression hidden. Evie Mai is a junior biology major and the eldest daughter who has never trod far off the beaten path. She has everything: good grades, a solid group of friends, and a smart, ambitious boyfriend, who’s the son of a well-connected university board member. But their busy schedules, as well as their interests, no longer align. Determined to close the distance, she and her boyfriend both apply to a student-run clinic for underserved communities. But will that save or expose the gaps in their relationship? When a clumsy accident brings Viet and Evie together, they bond over their shared hometown and similar history—and their orbits grow smaller as their friends collide. The more time they spend with each other and support each other, mentally and emotionally, the more their friendship shifts into something else. A sweet, emotional slice-of-life story, Solving for the Unknown is about characters questioning the paths they have taken and finding a new path that will lead them to their happiest selves.

Avg Rating
3.70
Number of Ratings
378
5 STARS
21%
4 STARS
39%
3 STARS
31%
2 STARS
8%
1 STARS
1%
goodreads

Author

Loan Le
Loan Le
Author · 2 books

Loan Le is the author of the YA rom-com, A Pho Love Story, and the forthcoming YA contemporary novel, Solving for the Unknown (out Fall 2024). Loan is the youngest child of two Vietnamese immigrants hailing from Nha Trang. She holds an MFA degree in fiction from Fairfield University, also her undergraduate alma mater. A Pushcart Prize–nominated writer, her short stories have appeared in CRAFT Literary, Mud Season Review, and Angel City Review. Loan is an editor at Simon and Schuster's Atria Books imprint and lives in Manhattan. Visit her website at writerloanle.com and find her on Twitter @loanloan.

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