The Latehomecomer

By: Kao Kalia Yang

Narrated by: Kao Kalia Yang

Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's Summary

In the 70s and 80s, thousands of Hmong families made the journey from the war-torn jungles of Laos to the overcrowded refugee camps of Thailand and onward to the United States, all in search of a new place to call home. Decades later, their experiences remain largely unknown.

Kao Kalia Yang was driven to tell her own family's story after her grandmother’s death. The Latehomecomer is a tribute to that grandmother, a remarkable woman whose spirit held her family together through their imprisonment in Laos, their narrow escape into Thailand's Ban Vinai Refugee Camp, their immigration to St. Paul when Yang was only six years old, and their transition to life in America. It is also an eloquent firsthand account of a people who have worked hard to make their voices heard in their adopted homeland.

©2008 Kao Kalia Yang (P)2011 HighBridge Company

Critic Reviews

"Yang tells her family’s story with grace; she narrates their struggles, beautifully weaving in Hmong folklore and culture. By the end of this moving, unforgettable book, when Yang describes the death of her beloved grandmother, readers will delight at how intimately they have become part of this formerly strange culture." ( Publishers Weekly)

"Yang intimately chronicles the immigrant experience from the Hmong perspective, providing a long-overdue contribution to the history and literature of ethnic America." ( Booklist)

Great Hmong history, lousy literature

I liked learning about Hmong history and culture, but this book’s relentlessly over-the-top sentimentality was too much for me. Especially the third act: just because you really really loved your grandma and felt really really sad that she died does not make it a good story worth telling every trivial detail about. And her one-note narrative voice, that seemed always to be begging for sympathy instead of creating it with a plot that does more than enumerate all the things that happened, made listening all the more difficult. I got the feeling the story was too close to her, that she was doing therapy rather than creating art.

2 of 3 people found this review helpful

Loved it!

wonderful narration! Loved it! very educational and well written! This is a book I will read again!

Quietly powerful

Beautifully written and quietly powerful story of immigration, love for family, and experience of loss.

familiar and inspiring story

Although a soft voice, she tells a powerful story of refugees and her family experience.

Thank you for sharing

A unique look into the experience of an immigrant family. The story comes from the heart. It has a voice of discovery, innocence, and great love.

Bravo

As a Hmong woman, this book brings back memories long forgotten. I loved it.

Skip listening!

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

Read the book, do not listen!

What was most disappointing about Kao Kalia Yang’s story?

Horrible voice narration.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Her voice made me feel very little sympathy for the characters.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

The narration made it hard for me to feel anything towards the characters.

Any additional comments?

Since listening to the book, I had read it. Liked it much better in print.

1 of 3 people found this review helpful

Beautiful and moving

Yang reads her story with great emotion and she tells her story so well that I feel like I have come to know her and her family. Phau ntawv no zoo kawg li tiag.

0 of 1 people found this review helpful