Up to Eleven...

[Vandal]

I just finished my eleventh novel (typing THE END is a wonderful feeling). It's the most serious book I've written and it was difficult to hold back my inner smart ass for 37,000 words.

Tentative title is ESCAPE TO AMERICA.


When he was a child, Bao Dang watched in horror as Communist soldiers dragged his parents from their house and sent them to a re-education center. Years later, under the darkness of night, thirteen-year-old Bao begins his journey out of Vietnam to escape the oppressive government in 1980.

With only the clothes on his back, he covertly travels by small boat down the Saigon River to the South China Sea, where he and 100 other "boat people" pack into a trawler designed to hold fewer than thirty. For six nerve-wracking days they travel south on the open water, living on rationed rice and very little water while avoiding police, pirates and facing the constant threat of capsizing.

Bao and the others find refuge at a camp in Indonesia. Bao harnesses the power of music to endure months of harsh living as he awaits word from relatives in the US. Finally, Bao is reunited with them in Rhode Island, leaving behind everything he had for the ultimate gift: freedom.


I wrote this with the help of a real-life boat person, who escaped in the early 80s. Now I just have to make it readable.

[Catfish]

Excellent! Congrats!
Love,