Where Rivers Part
A Story of My Mother's Life
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Where Rivers Part
Narrated by:
Pamela Xiong, Kao Kalia Yang
Buy Now for $28.95
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Narrated by:
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Pamela Xiong
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Kao Kalia Yang
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By:
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Kao Kalia Yang
About this listen
Born in 1961 in war-torn Laos, Tswb’s childhood was marked by the violence of America’s Secret War and the CIA recruitment of the Hmong and other ethnic minorities into the lost cause. By the time Tswb was a teenager, the US had completely vacated Laos, and the country erupted into genocidal attacks on the Hmong people, who were labeled as traitors. Fearing for their lives, Tswb and her family left everything they knew behind and fled their village for the jungle.
Perpetually on the run and on the brink of starvation, Tswb eventually crossed paths with the man who would become her future husband. Leaving her own mother behind, she joined his family at a refugee camp, a choice that would haunt her for the rest of her life. Eventually becoming a mother herself, Tswb raised her daughters in a state of constant fear and hunger until they were able to emigrate to the US, where the determined couple enrolled in high school even though they were both nearly thirty and worked grueling jobs to provide for their children.
Now, her daughter, Kao Kalia Yang, reveals her mother’s astonishing saga with tenderness and clarity, giving voice to the countless resilient refugees who are often overlooked as one of the essential foundations of this country. “Haunting and painfully relevant” (Booklist), Where Rivers Part is destined to become a classic.
Critic Reviews
"Author Kao Kalia Yang’s soft Hmong-accented voice opens this forthright and heartrending refugee story with the birth of her own children. She then moves on to chronicle family history from her mother Tswb’s (pronounced “Chew”) point of view. Yang narrates the introductory and concluding elements of the story herself, with Pamela Xiong picking up the body of the narrative, which includes episodes on her mother’s childhood, fleeing the Pathet Lao, finding safety in Minnesota, being changed by motherhood, and more. Xiong’s melodious tones and unhurried tempo keep listeners anchored in a memoir that does not always unfold in chronological order. Xiong’s facility with Hmong names, places, and sprinklings of conversation lend authenticity to her performance."
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