The Italy Letters
By Vi Khi Nao
2024
First Published
3.19
Average Rating
191
Number of Pages
A surreal, dream-like account of an achingly sensual love affair from a queer Vietnamese American novelist and cult favoriteThe Italy Letters is a slim, powerful shot of literary fantasia from one of America’s best-kept secrets. Long a cult favorite, visionary writer Vi Khi Nao weaves an unforgettable and highly distinctive story of a love affair suffused with longing, erotic passion, and heartbreak – all while painting a picture of the scabby underside of Las Vegas.This beautiful and mesmerizing novel by a queer Vietnamese American writer is a brilliant and unclassifiable work of fiction that takes the form of a series of letters written by the unnamed narrator to her lover in Italy … part of a stream-of-consciousness narrative that is by turns poignant, bawdy, funny, and disturbing – and often beautifully poetic. The story touches, obliquely but powerfully, on the immigrant experience, LGBTQIA identity, social class in the academy, writing, betrayal, sex, and homesickness. The narrator is in the process of caring for her declining mother, who is both deteriorating in health but remains imperious – not perhaps an uncommon dynamic, and one that is sketched with great compassion, humor, and yes, exasperation. The result is an authentically distinctive piece of writing from an underrated American writer on the cusp.
Avg Rating
3.19
Number of Ratings
200
5 STARS
14%
4 STARS
26%
3 STARS
35%
2 STARS
18%
1 STARS
9%
goodreads
Author
Vi Khi Nao
Author · 12 books
Vi Khi Nao holds an MFA in fiction from Brown University, where she received the John Hawkes and Feldman Prizes in fiction and the Kim Ann Arstark Memorial Award in poetry. Her work includes poetry, fiction, film and cross-genre collaboration. She is the author of two novellas, Swans In Half-Mourning (2013) and The Vanishing Point of Desire (2011), and her poetry collection, The Old Philosopher, was the winner of 2014 Nightboat Poetry Prize. Her manuscript, A Brief Alphabet of Torture, won the 2016 Ronald Sukenick Innovative Fiction Contest. In Fall 2016, Coffee House Press will publish her novel Fish in Exile. She lives in Iowa City, Iowa.
