A Year Without Home

In a world that craves understanding, there’s a book for that. This is one of those books. The finest kind.

In a house on the mountainside in Laos that provides a home to twenty-one people, grandmother, her children, and their children, Gao Sheng is content. She loves where she lives and the people who live with her.

The air smells like
trees after the rain,
like wet grass
with jiggly dewdrops
that tickle my toes,
like sunshine and smiles—
and I almost forget about the war,

The war that’s been here
for years
and years.

With descriptions that will evoke memories for every reader, Bidania helps us see everything about the mountains in Laos that makes it beloved. I imagine she carefully chose each word to fit into this story because I found myself admiring her phrasing, her focus drawing us in, the music of her language singing to me. It’s a novel in verse. For those of you who are sighing, already deciding this isn’t for you … wait!

There is such a strong story here that you will be turning pages avidly. The time is May 1975. The Vietnam War is drawing to a close. The Laotian soldiers who fought with the Americans are worried because Laos is about to fall to the communists. Their lives are in danger.

Eleven-year-old Gao Sheng’s father is the youngest captain in the Noble Army of Laos. The communists would like to round up all the soldiers who aided the Americans and re-educate them. Getting word ahead of time, her father asks the entire family to pack their belongings, only what they can carry, to escape to Thailand for the time being. They must leave behind their beloved dog and horse and school and some of their relatives who don’t see a threat.

This is the story of their escape, which is not smooth, and the courage the family assumes when they have to. Eventually, they wind up in two refugee camps, the first Nam Phong, the second Ban Vinai. They are there for too long, but Gao Sheng’s parents hope to return to their home in Laos so they turn down relocation offers to other countries. Life in a refugee camp is filled with new experiences, danger, laughter, and new skills.

Throughout the story, we learn that Gao Sheng is tired of her role as babysitter for her younger siblings, she is unhappy that her younger brother Yia is favored because he is the boy in the family, and she is bored with doing chores. When she speaks up for herself, expressing what she would like to do, she displays a different kind of courage and her parents are not unreasonable.

Told in the first person, I was surprised to learn in the author’s note that this is a fictional story based on V.T. Bidania’s older sister’s experiences. V.T. was too young to remember much when all of this happened. I was surprised, because the feelings Gao Sheng expresses are so interior, so self-examining. And they are feelings many of us have, no matter where we grew up, regardless of how old we are.

When you read this book, you will see our world through different eyes, from a heart that is young and hopeful … which is what we all need. Hope.

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A Year Without Home
V.T. Bidania
Nancy Paulsen Books

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