“No small achievement . . . Scenes of [Pham's] wild road adventure [are] worthy of Jack Kerouac.”
―The San Francisco Chronicle
*
Catfish and Mandala “is one of the unlikeliest seriocomic travel adventures on record.”
―Outside Magazine
*
“Thoreau, Theroux, Kerouac, Steinbeck, Mark Twain and William Least Heat-Moon--the roster of those who have turned to their travels for inspiration includes some of America's most noted scribes. Now add Andrew X. Pham to the list... Catfish and Mandala records a remarkable odyssey across landscape and into memory.”
―The Seattle Times
*
“Far more than a travelogue… Catfish and Mandala is a seamlessly constructed work deftly combining literary techniques with careful, evenhanded reportage… A gifted writer… Pham opens readers to the full sadness of the human condition on both sides of the world, marveling at spiritual resilience amid irreconcilable facts.”
―Roland Kelts, The Philadelphia Inquirer
*
"Stunning... A brilliantly written memoir in which a young Vietnamese-American uses a bicycle journey in his homeland as a vehicle to tell his eventful life story."
―Kirkus Reviews
*
“A modern Plutarch might pair Pham's story with that of Chris McCandless, the uncompromising young man whose spiritual quest led him to a forlorn death in Alaska. Pham, instead of seeking out remote places where he could explore fantasies of self-sufficiency, instinctively understood that self-knowledge emerges from engagement with others. In his passionate telling, his travelogue acquires the universality of a bildungsroman.” ―The New Yorker
“There are some books that writers shouldn’t read... because they are so good they make you despair that you could ever write so well yourself. The Eaves of Heavenby Andrew X. Pham, is such a book. Pham... is the best kind of memoirist... He understands a memoir is not really about oneself but about a period, a time, a people. . . . As a memoir, The Eaves of Heaven accomplishes what few polemics do – it is a sweeping personal indictment of war, a reassuring and yet merciless affirmation of the human spirit.”
—Portland Oregonian
*
“[A] gorgeously written book... [Pham] seems to have risen to a new level of quiet and powerful storytelling… The Eaves of Heaven is built from a series of short vignettes—some sweet, some horrifying—which are not recounted in chronological sequence, but linked in a narrative that darts nimbly across time, lingering on haunting scenes of brutality and violence as well as of beauty and love…. It's the absence of chronology that gives Thong's story its magic and depth, and allows it to be sustained by his observations of the ephemeral and the descriptions of unforgettable characters.”
—Washington Post Book World
*
“[A] searing story... The remembered images of more tranquil, carefree times are what make the subsequent depictions of wartime terrors and devastation so heartbreaking…. Pham has a novelist’s eye for telling details...”
—Seattle Times
*
“War-torn as it was, a lost world lives again in Thong’s recollections of the passions of his life: food, friends, family, romance. Personal tragedy and triumph, related with amazing perspective against an epic backdrop.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Describing her efforts to treat a young man burned by a phosphorous bomb, she writes, 'He looks as if he has been roasted in an oven.' Urgent, simple prose that pierces the heart.”
—Kirkus Reviews
*
“Now available for the first time in English – faithfully translated by prize-winning Vietnamese American journalist Pham – [LAST NIGHT I DREAMED OF PEACE] is witness to the unjust horrors and countless tragedies of war, a reminder made more pertinent every day.”
—The Bloomsbury Review
*
“Last Night I Dreamed of Peace is a book to be read by all and included in any course on the literature of war.”
—Chicago Tribune, Bich Minh Nguyen
*
“Remarkable…. A gift from a heroine who was killed at twenty-seven but whose voice has survived to remind us of the humanity and decency that endure amid—and despite—the horror and chaos of war.”
—Francine Prose, O, The Oprah Magazine
*
“As much a drama of feelings as a drama of war.”
—Seth Mydans, New York Times
*
“An illuminating picture of what life was like among the enemy guerrillas, especially in the medical community.”
—The VVA Veteran, official publication of Vietnam Veterans of America
HONORS
Kiriyama Nonfiction Prize
Whiting Writer Award
Guggenheim Fellowship
Nation Book Critics Circle Finalist
Oregon Literature Prize
Quality Paperback Non-Fiction Book Prize
NY Times Notable Book of the Year
Guardian Book Prize Shortlist Finalist
Seattle Times Book of the Year
Oregon Caldera Fellowship
Montalvo-Lucas Artist in Residence
San Francisco Chronicle Bestseller
Los Angeles Times Favorite Book
Washington Post Top Ten Book
Oregonian Top Ten Books of the Year
Bookmarks Magazine Best Book of the Year
Seattle Intelligencer Book of the Year
Barnes & Noble Discovery Writer
A 2009 Honor Book of the Asian/Pacific American Librarian Association