This novel is the fictionalized, century-long story of a king's concubine and her offspring. I found it exciting and well-written because I knew nothing about Vietnam, except whatever I could gather from the news during the Vietnam War. There is a good amount of historical facts in the novel, which makes the reading very interesting.

The first part of the story, that of the Mystique Concubine, reads like a fairy tale, but it is intensely real to her children and grand children. Then the story turns tragic.

The novel is told by the concubine's great granddaughter Simone, and it also includes Simone's personal sad story as well.

The beginning setting is the Violet City of Hue; then the setting moves from there, back and forth, to Saigon, Paris, and the United States.

The characters are powerful and authentic, even if quirky by our standards, and the story flows well without confusing the reader, in spite of its many different twists and turns.

The prose is beautiful and poetic, although at times, it can turn overly dramatic, but since it is told from the viewpoint of the young woman who has suffered through it all, this is understandable.

I have nothing but a huge praise for this novel. It is an epic that deserves a high place on any literary or historical fiction lover's shelf.

everything, even if it meant to read several passages again, but this was only because of my ignorance of Vietnam and what it went through, during its sad history.

is Uyen Nicole Duong who arrived at the United States at the age of sixteen, during the fall of Saigon. She has been a journalist, public education administrator, attorney, law professor, and a self-taught painter, according to her bio in Amazon.com, as she has received several degrees after coming to USA. She now resides in Houston, Texas.

in many ways, it was an eye-opener for me, which made me empathize more with what the Vietnamese people have gone through.

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Created Apr 26, 2014 at 8:09pm • Submit your own review...