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Inside Out and Back Again

Thanhha Lai

4.11 · Rating details · 35,646 ratings · 5,644 reviews

Inside Out and Back Again is a #1 New York Times bestseller, a Newbery Honor Book, and a winner of the National Book Award!

Inspired by the author's childhood experience as a refugee—fleeing Vietnam after the Fall of Saigon and immigrating to Alabama—this coming-of-age debut novel told in verse has been celebrated for its touching child's-eye view of family and immigration. ...more

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Paperback, 288 pages

Published January 2nd 2013 by HarperCollins (first published February 22nd 2011)

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· 35,646 ratings · 5,644 reviews

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Apr 28, 2016 Emily May rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Emily May by: Helen Hoang

Shelves: coverly-love, 2019, childrens, historical-fiction, poetry

No one would believe me
but at times
I would choose
wartime in Saigon
over
peacetime in Alabama.

I'd been saving this for when my kids got a little older so we could read it together, but when Helen Hoang mentioned it in the author's note for The Bride Test, I knew I couldn't wait that long. No matter, I'll read it again with them in a few years. It's a beautiful little book.

Inside Out & Back Again is a free verse poem that tells the tale of a Vietnamese family fleeing South Vietnam just before ...more

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Jul 03, 2016 Ahmad Sharabiani rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: historical, 21th-century, fiction, young-adult

Inside Out & Back Again, Thanhha Lai
Inside Out & Back Again is a verse novel by Thanhha Lai. The book was awarded the 2011 National Book Award for Young People's Literature and one of the two Newbery Honors. The novel was based on her first year in the United States, as a ten-year-old girl who spoke no English in 1975. Inside Out and Back Again is a story about a young girl named Kim Hà and her family being forced to move to the United States because the Vietnam War had reached their hom Inside Out & Back Again, Thanhha Lai
Inside Out & Back Again is a verse novel by Thanhha Lai. The book was awarded the 2011 National Book Award for Young People's Literature and one of the two Newbery Honors. The novel was based on her first year in the United States, as a ten-year-old girl who spoke no English in 1975. Inside Out and Back Again is a story about a young girl named Kim Hà and her family being forced to move to the United States because the Vietnam War had reached their home, and it was no longer safe. They board a navy ship and flee. Upon spending a couple months at a refugee camp, they end up moving to Alabama. There she struggles with learning English and confronting bullies, including one that she nicknamed Pink Boy, at her new school. Hà at one point said, "No one would believe me but at times I would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama." Eventually, she has pushed through those hard times with the help of their next door neighbor, Mrs. Washington and the support of her family. In the beginning of the book, it mentions that Hà's father, a soldier in the Vietnam war, was captured by the North Vietnamese Army when she was only a year old. In the end, Hà's family figures out that unfortunately, her father had died while in North Vietnamese hands. Hà then gets used to living in the U.S and her family celebrates the new year. She prays for good things to happen to her and her family. The main resolution of the book is family importance.
عنوانها: زندگی پشت و رو؛ در رویای خانه؛ نویسنده: تانا (تاینها) لایی؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز چهاردهم ماه نوامبر سال 2016 میلادی
عنوان: زندگی پشت و رو؛ نویسنده: تانا (تاینها) لایی؛ مترجم: بهزاد صادقیان؛ تهران، آفرینگان، 1395؛ در 318 ص؛ شابک: 9786003910256؛ موضوع: داستانهای امریکائیان ویتنامی تبار - سده 21 م
عنوان: در رویای خانه؛ نویسنده: تانا (تاینها) لایی؛ مترجم: زهره خرمی؛ تهران، پرتقال، 1395؛ در 262 ص؛ شابک: 9786008111641؛
یک دختر ده ساله ویتنامی، به نام: «ها»؛ شخصیت اصلی است، او روزهای خود را با مراقبت از درخت پاپایا، گوش دادن به قصه‌ های مادر، انتظار برای برگشتن پدری که هرگز او را ندیده، و سر و کله زدن با سه برادر بزرگتر خویش میگذراند. اما آنگاه که آتش جنگ در ویتنام جنوبی شعله ور می‌شود، «ها» مجبور می‌شود، همراه خانواده‌ اش سوار کشتی شده، ویتنام را ترک کند. «زندگی پشت و رو» روایتگر سالهای سرنوشت ساز زندگی همین دختر است. ا. شربیانی ...more

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Apr 18, 2012 Sandra rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

{This review originally appeared on Clear Eyes, Full Shelves.}

I now understand
when they make fun of my name,
yelling ha-ha-ha down the hall
when they ask if I eat dog meat,
barking and chewing and falling down laughing
when they wonder if I lived in the jungle with tigers,
growling and stalking on all fours.

I understand
because Brother Khoi
nodded into my head
on the bike ride home
when I asked if kids
said the same things
at his school.

Thanhha Lai writes her verses in her award winning middle grade novel ...more

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Jun 17, 2016 Nat rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: diverse-reads

“I’m practicing
to be seen.”

This book grabbed my attention with its beautiful cover, and I’m really glad that it did. Inside Out and Back Again tells the tale of Kim Hà and her journey during wartime in Vietnam.

Hà and her family are forced to flee as Saigon falls, and they board a ship headed toward Alabama.

In America, the family has to start anew, where they discover the coldness of its strangers, the dullness of its food, the strange shape of its landscape . . . and the strength of their very o ...more

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Nov 17, 2016 Kelly (and the Book Boar) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: really-for-kidlets, read-in-2016, liburrrrrry-book

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/#ud...

For those of you who know me, you might remember last year I discovered my youngest was failing to get his required nightly reading completed by opting to sit on the toilet and stare at the wall for 20 minutes every night rather than ever opening a flippin’ book. That little revelation led to us buddy reading Wonder. Unfortunately the boy child still appears to have been swapped with someone else’s baby and has yet to discover th Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/#ud...

For those of you who know me, you might remember last year I discovered my youngest was failing to get his required nightly reading completed by opting to sit on the toilet and stare at the wall for 20 minutes every night rather than ever opening a flippin’ book. That little revelation led to us buddy reading Wonder. Unfortunately the boy child still appears to have been swapped with someone else’s baby and has yet to discover the wonderful world of book loving, so we are buddying up again this year. After having much success with The Outsiders and All American Boys he took his teacher’s recommendation and we ended up with this one - and wow what an important and timely little book it was.

Told in verse, Inside Out and Back Again is about Hà, a young girl growing up in war torn Vietnam. With the fall of Saigon, Hà’s family realizes they can no longer hold on to the hope of remaining in their country and flee to America via ship. Upon reaching a refugee camp in Florida, Hà’s mother chooses Alabama as their final destination in hopes that her children can have the life she dreamed of – college, families, careers, etc. This is the story of Hà’s first year in America.

First things first, since this was told in verse my kiddo was able to read it in only a couple of days which made him feel AWESOME so thank you Thanhha Lai for that format. And most importantly, to the messages presented. . .

“You deserve to grow up
where you don’t worry about
saving half a bite of sweet potato”

“Everyone knows the ship
could sink,
unable to hold
the piles of bodies
that keep crawling on
like raging ants
from a disrupted nest.
But no one
is heartless enough
to say
stop
because what if
they had been
stopped
before their turn?”

“Mother says,
People share when they know
they have escaped hunger.
Shouldn’t we share
because there is hunger?”

They are something we should all be thinking of . . .

Now I need a little bit of help choosing our next book (I’m leaning toward Sherman Alexie, but not 100% committed). We’ve definitely found a formula that is working – topics that are relevant to today, the shorter the better so dude feels like he’s making progress and maintains interest, NO instalovin’ mumbo jumbo, NO dystopia, would prefer something that is not a potential “required read” (i.e., The Lord of the Flies, The Chocolate War, etc.). Thanks in advance for any suggestions!
...more

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Mar 07, 2011 babyhippoface rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: all teachers

Shelves: social-studies, poetry, historical, kids-fiction

Read this straight through in one evening. It repeatedly put me in mind of an outstanding teacher at my school, whose family immigrated to the United States when she was about Ha's age. When we had a "Guess That Baby Picture" contest at school, she brought a school photo of herself around the age of 8, because that was all she had. There were no baby photos of her, no visual memories of her early years; they were too poor for photographs. All through this book I kept thinking, "I wonder if this Read this straight through in one evening. It repeatedly put me in mind of an outstanding teacher at my school, whose family immigrated to the United States when she was about Ha's age. When we had a "Guess That Baby Picture" contest at school, she brought a school photo of herself around the age of 8, because that was all she had. There were no baby photos of her, no visual memories of her early years; they were too poor for photographs. All through this book I kept thinking, "I wonder if this is what it was like for her," and "I have to give her a copy of this book, see what she thinks of it."

Me? I thought it was wonderful. I am always drawn to novels written in free verse. The form forces a talented author to show clarity and emotion with minimal language, and Lai's is just beautiful. It helped me understand what it would feel like to move from a familiar, beloved homeland to a new country with foreign customs, words, foods, and faces, to suddenly feel stupid because you cannot communicate verbally. Entitled Feel Dumb, this poem expresses that feeling succinctly:

MiSSS SScott / points to me, / then to the letters / of the English alphabet.

I say / A B C and so on.

She tells the class to clap.

I frown.

MiSSS SScott / points to the numbers / along the wall.

I count up to twenty.

The class claps / on its own.

I'm furious, / unable to explain / I already learned / fractions / and how to purify / river water.

So this is / what dumb / feels like.

I hate, hate, hate it.

Because of Lai's insight, I gain insight myself. I can place myself in Ha's shoes in that moment. I feel what she is feeling. And I hurt for her. I get a sense of how must it feel to be physically and verbally attacked because I look different from everyone else in the room, because I cannot speak their words, because I practice a different religion, because I am an outsider with no idea of how I can make them understand me, know me. I am able to see how even good intentions can hurt, as the situation in the above poem and several others demonstrate.

There is so much pain in this little novel, but oh, so much hope. Just beautiful. ...more

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Jan 20, 2014 Moe rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: 8th-grade

Let me tell you something. If I wasn't forced to write so many essay's about this stupid book, then I might have enjoyed it more. Maybe if we didn't have to analyze every sentence discussing every little detail until I accidentally tear one of the papers out because we had to flip back so many times, I probably might have enjoyed it more. This could have been a great book, and it's a shame that the new common core thinks we are "Learning" from writing useless paragraphs on how Ha's experience re ...more

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Feb 08, 2011 Betsy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Thinking about the most memorable of children's novels, one trait in all of them has to ring true in order for them to click with their readers. The books must contain some kind of "meaning". Even the frothiest Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-type offering isn't going to remain long in the public's brain if there isn't at least a little "meaning" slipped in there. Now when I use the term "meaning" I'm being purposefully vague because it's not the kind of thing you can easily define. What is me Thinking about the most memorable of children's novels, one trait in all of them has to ring true in order for them to click with their readers. The books must contain some kind of "meaning". Even the frothiest Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-type offering isn't going to remain long in the public's brain if there isn't at least a little "meaning" slipped in there. Now when I use the term "meaning" I'm being purposefully vague because it's not the kind of thing you can easily define. What is meaningful to one person might strike another as trite or overdone. I personally believe that adult novels contain this saccharine faux-meaning a lot more often than their juvenile contemporaries, and why not? Adult books can get away with it while children's books are read by the harshest of all possible critics: children. As a librarian and a reviewer, I'm pretty tough too. I get mighty suspicious of prose that gets a little too lyrical or characters that spout the book's thinly disguised premise on every other page. All this is leading up to the fact that when I turned my jaded suspicion-filled toxic eyeballs on Thanhha Lai's Inside Out and Back Again I found nothing to displease me. Lai's debut novel speaks with a natural voice that's able to make salient points and emotional scenes without descending into overly sentimental goo. This author makes a point to draw from her own life. The result is a novel that works in every conceivable way.

"No one would believe me but at times I would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama." Ha has known both in her life, actually. Born in Vietnam during the war, Ha lives with her mother and three older brothers. Her father disappeared years ago on a navy mission when Ha was just one. Today the family doesn't even know if he's alive, but when the chance comes to flee Saigon and make a new life in America, Ha's mother doesn't hesitate. Once they're settled in Alabama, Ha has a whole new set of problems ahead of her. She's homesick, mad that she's no longer the smartest girl in class, and tormented after school by some of the boys. Yet the solution, it seems, is not to become someone different but to take what she is already and find a way to make her new life work.

In a way Inside Out and Back Again kind of marks the second coming of the verse novel. A couple years ago this style of writing for children was hugely popular, helped in no small part by Newbery Award winning books like Karen Hesse's Out Of The Dust. For some it represented the perfect way to get to the heart of a story without unnecessary clutter. Unfortunately, others regarded it as a quick and easy way to write a novel with a word count only slightly higher than your average picture book. The market was saturated and finally verse novels began to peter out. It finally got to the point where I became convinced that the only way a verse novel would work would be if there was some reason for it to even BE in verse. If the author couldn't justify the format then why did they even choose that style of writing? I haven't reviewed a verse novel since 2009's Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba by Margarita Engle and like Engle's book, Thanhha Lai's novel is written in verse for a concrete, very good reason. In both cases you have stories where children were entering strange new lands where they did not necessarily know the language. To make this book a verse novel, the child reader gets to be inside Ha's head while at the same time encountering sentences that are broken up in ways different from your average middle grade novel. The result is simultaneously intimate and isolating. It's perfect.

There are a fair number of children's books about immigrants coming to America, most of them historical in some way. Ha's story feels a bit more contemporary since it's set in the late 20th century. Other immigrant stories for kids always cover the same territory (hostile neighbors, the other kids at school, strange foods, etc.). What I like about Lai's book is that Ha does something I've rarely seen immigrant characters do in books for kids. She gets mad. I mean really rip-roaring, snorting, furious. Here she is, a bright kid, and now she has to feel like she's stupid all that time at school simply because English isn't her first language. It's infuriating! And it was this spark of anger that cinched Ha's character for me. You can have a sympathetic protagonist set upon by the world all you want, but when that character exhibits an emotion other than mere passive acceptance or sorrow, that's when you find something about them to hold on to. Ha's anger lets child readers really understand her. It's necessary to who she is, drilled home by the section called "Wishes". In that two page spread, Ha discusses all the things she wishes for, including the return of her father. Then, tellingly, "Most I wish I were still smart."

Maybe what I really liked about the book was that it wasn't a one trick pony. Sure, much of it is about moving to America and what that's like. But it's also a novel about family. Ha's brothers are hugely annoying to her when the family is living in Vietnam. They're all older, after all, and they get a bit more attention and freedom. When the family uproots and leaves everything they've known behind, Ha begins to connect to them in new ways. She becomes a comfort and helpmate to her brother Khoi when he suffers a kind of nervous breakdown over the death of his baby chick. She learns self-defense from Vu, her Bruce Lee obsessed brother. And of course it's her brother Quang who really saves the day for her in the end (I won't give away how). The change is slow in coming, which keeps it from feeling manipulative or false. It's just a natural coming together of family members in a hostile world. Good stuff.

As for the writing itself, I'm a bit tired of the term "lyrical". That's just personal, though, and I'm sure that if you troll the professional reviews for descriptions of the book that word will surface again and again in relation to this book. With good reason, of course. Lai knows from which she speaks. At the same time, though, she's making choices in the narrative that I found very interesting. For example, at first you think that you're reading a kind of pseudo-diary of Ha's life since her first two entries comes with dates (February 11th and 12th, respectively). Yet when you hit the third piece, it describes the ways in which Ha's brothers tease her ending, not with a specific date, but with the phrase, "Every day". In this way Lai is able to separate out the things that happen only once on a specific day and those things that occur frequently. It's a subtle technique, but it makes the author's point. Lai also makes small notes about the world that give a person pause. Since this is the story of a girl moving to Alabama in the early 70s, it will probably prompt a lot of discussion in bookgroups when she says of the cafeteria, "On one side of the bright, noisy room, light skin. Other side, dark skin. Both laughing, chewing, as if it never occurred to them someone medium would show up."

Lai is also able to teach kids about Vietnamese society without coming off all school marmish. I knew about the holiday of Tet in a vague sense (mostly from Ten Mice for Tet), but what I didn't know was that not only is Tet a Vietnamese New Year's, it's also the day everyone celebrates their own birthdays.

All told, Inside Out and Back Again has the brevity of a verse novel packed with a punch many times its size. It's one of the lovelier books I've read in a long time, and can make you think about and question the entire immigrant novel genre, so long a permanent part of the American children's literary canon. Lai drew upon much of her own life to write this book. Now I'd like to see what she's capable of when she looks at other subjects as well. Great new author. Great new book.

For ages 9-12. ...more

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Oct 07, 2017 Maha rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: poetry-and-prose

I always love a good verse novel, and this book was just that.

A story about immigration and attempts to adapt to a new culture, Inside Out & Back Again was truly beautiful and heartwarming. It touched me emotionally on the struggles Hà had to deal with.
Hà is different from everyone around her. She is a Vietnamese girl among Americans. She is the weird black-haired girl in her school. She is the girl everyone makes fun of. Despite all this, Hà tries to stay strong and continues working and h ...more

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Jul 25, 2018 Kristy K rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1st-person-pov, 2018, children, told-in-verse

This book has been on my radar (and my shelves) for a while and I’m glad I finally read it. Told in verse from the POV of 10 year old Hà, we get a glimpse into life in Vietnam during the war, the journey of a refugee, and the struggles to adapt and be accepted in a new country. Truly a wonderful, heartfelt (and sometimes heartbreaking) book.

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May 31, 2015 Rebecca rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-2015, ohana-means-family, childrens-middle-grade-fiction, library-books, young-adult-fiction, historical-fiction, standalone-novel, diverse-cultural-poc, poetry-verse, ooooh-pretty

Read this review and more on my blog

In a nutshell: A beautifully written story of immigration told through verse and the eyes of a young girl.

After the Fall of Saigon at the end of the war in Vietnam, Hà and her family are forced to flee home. Inside Out & Back Again tells their story, inspired by the author's experiences, of leaving their home, spending many wary days at sea unsure of their future, and finally immigrating to Alabama. Through Hà's eyes, the reader experiences the difficultie Read this review and more on my blog

In a nutshell: A beautifully written story of immigration told through verse and the eyes of a young girl.

After the Fall of Saigon at the end of the war in Vietnam, Hà and her family are forced to flee home. Inside Out & Back Again tells their story, inspired by the author's experiences, of leaving their home, spending many wary days at sea unsure of their future, and finally immigrating to Alabama. Through Hà's eyes, the reader experiences the difficulties of leaving a place so familiar to her and struggling to settle in America, where everything is so different - the food, people, language, her family, life.

Inside Out & Back Again is written in free verse, making it a quick and engaging read. It's an effective style that immediately drew me in. While the writing was simple, it was beautiful. I finished the book in practically one sitting but despite being such a quick read, it's had a significant impact on me. I was so caught up in Hà's story and I've been inspired to do more research on the history and experiences detailed in the book. It's not really something I've read or know too much about. Many of us take for granted a lot of things and in hindsight, the hardships I faced when I moved from England to Australia are so weak in comparison. At least I didn't have to learn another language! As Hà often pointed out, English is weird.

My only real problem with the book is that I wish that it was longer. I just felt like I needed just a bit more time with the characters or to just know what happened later. My imagination can do an okay job, but it needed something more in my opinion.

Something I particularly liked was how it was fiction layered with fact. The fact that it was based partly on Thanhha Lai's own experiences made it more real, rather than a simple regurgitation of things anyone could read in a textbook. It was such a raw, realistic and beautiful story. I'd recommend it to everyone.

Initial review:
A beautifully written story of a girl and her family, who leave Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War and live in America. It's about their triumphs and struggles, and it's written in verse, which makes it a quick, simplistic yet lovely read. I just wish that it was longer. ...more

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May 24, 2011 Wendy rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011-award-possibilities, newbery-honor

Hey, reviewers? A lot of you are using the word "prose" where you mean "poetry", and I can't take it.

Also, there are actually lots and lots of kids' and YA books written in verse. Thanks.

Anyway, actual review: I find it difficult to review this, just like I found it difficult to review the last novel-in-verse about a Vietnamese refugee in the 1970s that I read, All the Broken Pieces. Like anything negative I might say is me judging the immigrant experience itself.

At first I didn't like this that ...more

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Mar 11, 2019 Book Concierge rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: culture, social-commentary, alabama, coming-of-age, poetry, strong-women, vietnam, concierge, audio, library

Audiobook performed by Doan Ly

Ha is the 10-year-old daughter of a Vietnamese Navy Officer who has gone missing while on a mission. As the Americans pull out of the war and Saigon is about to fall, Ha and her family escape the country via ship. Eventually they gain a sponsor, and the family tries to start over in the USA, a strange land, where the language, food, customs and religion are all different than what they are used to.

This middle-grade novel focusing on the immigrant experience is told ...more

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Jan 09, 2018 Romie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: poetry, vietnamese, adult, historical, representation-matters, asian-rep-of-my-heart, owned-books

It's a book I didn't know exist until a few days ago, and I'm truly glad it came into my life.

This book deeply touched me because my dad's own family immigrated from Vietnam to France and the Vietnamese culture is one I grew up hearing about but never truly experienced it.

This story follows Hà, her mother and three brothers, through their journey from a Vietnam at war to an American that doesn't necessarily welcome them with opened arms. It's a book about being stripped off your culture, your la ...more

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Oct 08, 2014 Liz Janet rated it really liked it

Putting side that I was not the biggest fan of the writing, because I do not think that simply separating sentences with a lot of space is poetry, the story and her experiences made up for it.
“Whoever invented English
should have learned
to spell.”

It is not often that I see a book about immigration to which I can relate. I come from an European background and nationally, I am Caribbean, so I have the whole, not a native English speaker, but still get white privilege thing. This book took me back ...more

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Nov 06, 2017 Tamanna rated it it was ok · review of another edition

If you love lyrical books you will love this book. I couldn't stop reading it.

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Apr 25, 2017 Erica rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: jf, dead-friends-and-family, growing-up, asia, life-in-school, historical-fiction, racism, mothers-and-their-kids, women-and-girls, audiobook

I don't recommend listening to this one. The narration is stiff and the Vietnamese words are spoken in italics (see Older's thoughts on italicizing a native language)

I didn't read this one with my eyes because I have an aversion to novels in verse. While they can be more nuanced than the typical novel and though you have to work harder to get to the depths due to a scarcity of words, they seem choppy to me, jarring, and a little flighty. I'm not a fan of poetry, either, so the whole paint a big ...more

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Aug 04, 2016 Jessaka rated it really liked it · review of another edition

"No one would believe me
but at times/I would choose
wartime in Saigon
over
peacetime in Alabama."

This prize winning book is powerful and sad. A young girl named Kim Ha has to leave Vietnam during the war and ends up in the southern State of Alabama.

To begin with, Kim Ha's father has been MIA for 10 years, and after they leave for America they wonder how he can find them if he comes home. So already Kim Ha has sadness in her heart. There is so much more that she has to leave in Vietnam, mainly her p ...more

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Feb 10, 2013 Tania rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: favorite-books, historical-fiction

A short, but significant, story. This book is one of the reasons reading is so important. How else would we understand what it feels like to be a refugee? I firmly believe if more people read this or similar books, there would be fewer acts of xenophobia. I've never read a book written in free verse, but I absolutely loved it. I thought the fact that the author could get you to feel so much for the characters with so few words was amazing. Highly recommended.

"Her brows twist
so much
we hush."

Des ...more

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Dec 20, 2017 Zoe's Human rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Everyone

Shelves: lt

No matter how old you are, whether or not you like poetry or not, you should still read this. I'm 45, I'm not into poetry, and I loved this. In spare but elegant verse, the story of one year in the life of a girl is told. A year where Saigon falls and her family becomes refugees fleeing to safety in the United States. A year of coming to terms with a new culture and language. A year of struggle as a forced immigrant. This is amazing both as a piece of literature and as a learning experience.

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Jun 03, 2019 Brierly added it · review of another edition

Shelves: reviewed, middle-grade, poetry, historical-fiction, audiobooks

Inside Out & Back Again is the debut novel from Thanhha Lai, who incorporates her own childhood memories of fleeing the Vietnam war as a refugee to Alabama in the 1970s. I love middle grades quasi-memoir, especially when I see that it is written in verse, so I pinned this one to the top of my TBR when a student mentioned it to me earlier in 2019. This is the first book I have read while being absolutely positive that I will be teaching sixth grade English (!) for the foreseeable future. Read Inside Out & Back Again is the debut novel from Thanhha Lai, who incorporates her own childhood memories of fleeing the Vietnam war as a refugee to Alabama in the 1970s. I love middle grades quasi-memoir, especially when I see that it is written in verse, so I pinned this one to the top of my TBR when a student mentioned it to me earlier in 2019. This is the first book I have read while being absolutely positive that I will be teaching sixth grade English (!) for the foreseeable future. Reading Inside Out was the perfect appetizer to the piles and piles of middle grades books that I have stockpiled while oscillating between wanting to teach high school English (mostly YA) and middle school English (mostly middle grades).

Hà is ten years old in 1975. The story begins on Tết, where Hà and her entire family mark the calendar one year older. Hà lives in Saigon and if you needed a quick refresher on the Vietnam war (I did!) her family is politically aligned with South Vietnam, and therefore, aligned with the United States and capitalist democracy. Hà, her mother, and her three brothers are anxious about the fate of their father, who is a P.O.W. in North Vietnam. The novel does an excellent job of contrasting the visceral fear of living in a war zone with the cultural touchstones that make Saigon home to Hà, like eating juicy papaya and the mouth-watering umami saltiness of nước mắm (a.k.a. fish sauce).

Our lives
will twist and twist,
intermingling the old and the new
until it doesn't matter
which is which.

If you read the summary, you know that Hà will become a refugee bound for Alabama, so I am not too worried about spoilers in revealing that. I was drawn to this narrative because of the setting during the fall of Saigon and Hà's subsequent relocation to Alabama, but it was the emotional details from Hà's coming-of-age experience that won me over. Perhaps it is the blend of Thanhha Lai's powerful memories with the creative liberty to reinterpret Hà as a fictional narrator. Recommended to those who love multi-hyphenate reading because this is certainly a middle-grades-historical-fiction-written-in-verse not to miss. ...more

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Apr 22, 2019 tasha rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: mg-and-ya, poetry-free-verse

I'm sold! If you asked me as early as last week "do you read poetry?" I'd answer with a resounding "no, absolutely not!". Fast forward to today and I would say "is it free verse? Then absolutely yes!". I've never heard of free verse poetry but I like it!

Inside Out & Back Again is a year's journey told through verse of a young immigrant girl fleeing from Saigon. I felt like I got to know her through the sparse and beautiful poetry/verse. This book has been on the NYTimes Bestseller list, a N ...more

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Aug 30, 2018 Hasna M. 8B rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This historical fiction was special because the main character, Ha, experiences the same things as the author did when she was 10. It did get a little confusing because not everything that happened was recorded so it looked like she skipped parts. I still loved it!

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Nov 16, 2017 Kate S. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I love this book!!! It is about a young Vietnamese girl and her family. It is a great story told in her perspective. It shows the struggles of being brought into a new land (America). She has to face lots of problems whether that be losing her papaya tree or facing the schools bully. I would totally recommend this book!!!!

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Oct 15, 2011 Barbara rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: bullies, nbgs2012, immigration, ncbla, novels-in-verse

This moving novel in verse chronicles a year in the life of a young girl who must leave behind all that is familiar for a world where everything is strange and new. It is 1975, and as the war draws closer to her Saigon, Vietnam home, Ha reflects on the whereabouts of her missing father and the family's difficult straits. When they have the chance to flee, the family boards a boat, eventually ending up in Alabama. The book illustrates perfectly many of the struggles immigrants face as they deal w ...more

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Nov 25, 2015 Martha☀ rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: library

In this short, easy-to-read collection of poems, 10 year old Ha recounts one year of upheaval in her life as she is forced to leave Saigon upon the invasion of North Vietnam. She and her family escape on an over-crowded navy ship one day before the fall of Saigon and they take shelter at the US naval base on Guam. Eventually, her family of five arrive in the US as refugees and are taken in by a generous sponsor in Alabama where they finally settle, find jobs and go to school. The one-year transi ...more

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Jan 30, 2015 isabelle rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: book-besties, books-that-linger, i-need-more, i-bow-down-to-you, coverly-love, interesting, middle-grade, fast-paced, kick-butt-female-lead, might-reread

Review to come. (And the list grows larger)

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May 01, 2011 David rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, poetry, kids-fiction, coming-of-age

Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai

I was in the US Navy in 1975, headed toward the Philippines when our squadron personnel were off-loaded in Hawaii so that our carrier could rush to the coast of Vietnam to pick up refugees fleeing South Vietnam before it fell to Communist forces. So this story has particular personal meaning.

Like most Americans, I owe the life I live to the courage and hope of immigrant ancestors. The powerfulness of this story rings true. The US is a nation of immigrants ...more

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Mar 14, 2018 Krista rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2018

What a moving story, written in verse, of a young girl and her family who came to America as refugees at the end of the Vietnam War. I learned so much about this time in history and through the story of this family saw the struggles many like them experienced in leaving their home, losing loved ones, dealing with ignorance, bullies and prejudice, the difficulty of learning English, and the huge clash of cultures and religion. I think Thanhha Lai did a beautiful job of helping me to see the hurt ...more

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Nov 11, 2017 Ritika Gupta rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: poetry, makes-you-yearn, stolen-childhoods, war, should-be-re-read, true-accounts, world-history, asia, free-verse-poetry, america

A young girl's heart touching story set in Saigon during Vietnam war and the family's subsequent immigration to America. Story written in free-verse style.

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Great Middle Grad...: * BOTM for May is Inside Out and Back Again!	10	41	May 23, 2019 09:00PM
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About Thanhha Lai

Thanhha Lai

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Thanhha Lai was born in Vietnam. At the end of the war, she fled with her family to Alabama. There, she learned English from fourth graders. She then spent the next decade correcting her grammar. Starting her writing life as journalist, she worked at The Orange County Register. She switched to fiction, leading to an MFA from New York University and short story publications in various journals and ...more