“A lively, engaging novel of sisterly angst and the cultural heritage … an exceptional debut, funny, insightful and literary, with lots to mull over after you put it down.”
— Chicago Tribune
This absorbing novel about two sisters is like a prism reflecting essential questions in a variety of subtle, sharp, glistening ways: What makes a family? A home? An American? Without sentimentality, Nguyen takes on these questions bravely and with graceful intelligence.
– Elizabeth Strout, author of Olive Kitteridge, winner of the Pulitzer Prize
“More sad than funny, more real than lightweight, Nguyen’s story offers its characters not revenge, redemption or even success, but acceptance. Even in the country of tall people, short will have to be good enough.” — Marion Winik, Los Angeles Times
“Nguyen’s debut novel is a poignant look at immigrants and their children finding their identity as Americans.” – People magazine
“Nguyen offers a tender dissection of Asian American family life – the isolation that comes from being separated from relatives and deprived of the comforts of belonging to a larger culture. She wields the theme of shortness with great subtlety and nuance, not only mining it for comedy but also using it as a metaphor for the many ways we feel out of place in the world, which is no mean feat.” — Grace Park, San Francisco Chronicle
“During the several months in which the book’s central events occur, the sisters, longtime rivals, grow closer when…Linny confides that she has a married lover and Van an overbearing, distant husband. Their dilemmas provide the framework for larger concerns, among them how to remain true to their family, community and ethnic heritage when American life pulls the opposite way….[T]he sisters learn not only who they are, but where geographically, psychologically and emotionally they belong….Bich Minh Nguyen’s lovely, loving tale of Midwestern immigrant life is finally a deeply American book about place and placelessness. ” — Minneapolis Star Tribune
“[A] detailed character study of second-generation sisters who find themselves more anchored by their Vietnamese heritage than they had realized. … Nguyen’s novel is clever and lively, a fine update to a familiar setup.” – Publisher’s Weekly
“…this lovely first novel becomes much more-a depiction of immigrant culture in which everyone is a short person trying to measure up to the United States..” – Library Journal(starred review)
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