''Cockfighter'' displays Lapcharoensap's gift for the quick detail that catches not only his Thai milieu, but teenage life everywhere. And ''Priscilla,'' which describes gradations of poverty in the third world, is near-perfect in its lyricism, wistfulness and concision. Some recent debuts may be more consistent than Sightseeing is, but few attain its heights.
— The New York Times
Lapcharoensap's writing is both elegant and vivid. When occasionally his stories seem too perfectly sculpted, I wonder if the problem is reading too many at once. When I come back to them, their characters and images again seem alive.
— The Washington Post
The Thailand of Westerners' dreams shares space with a Thailand plagued by social and economic inequality in this auspicious debut collection of seven plaintive and luminous stories. In the title tale-an exquisite meditation on human dependency-a son and his ailing mother must accept the dismal reality of her encroaching blindness and what it means for his plans to attend college away from home. In "Don't Let Me Die in This Place," the most exuberant of the stories, an ornery and uproarious widowed grandfather, recently crippled by a stroke, moves from Maryland to Bangkok to live with his son, Thai daughter-in-law and their two "mongrel children." "Farangs" and "At the Caf Lovely" convincingly examine adolescent friendship and love, as does "Priscilla the Cambodian"-though when a refugee camp is torched by native Thai xenophobes, it veers toward the politically dark and ominous. Politics and fear also play a role in "Draft Day," a painfully grim story about two young male friends, one of whom avoids military conscription because of his privileged background, and "Cockfighter," the final and longest of the pieces, in which a berserk local thug rules a town through violence and corruption. Young or old, male or female, all of Lapcharoensap's spirited narrators are engaging and credible. Anger, humor and longing are neatly balanced in these richly nuanced, sharply revelatory tales. Agent, Amy Williams at Collins McCormick Literary Agency. (Jan.) Forecast: With foreign rights already sold in eight countries, and blurbs from Charles Baxter and Allan Gurganus, this stellar debut will likely be one of the most widely reviewed and read story collections of the year. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
This debut collection by 25-year-old Thai American Lapcharoensap is a welcome addition to the continually expanding and diversified realm of Asian American literature. Born in Chicago and raised in Bangkok, the author introduces American readers to lives where activities like cockfighting are seemingly as typical as learning to ride a motorcycle. Though the stories describe a culture that will be foreign to most readers, they contain themes that touch on the human spirit. In the opening piece, "Farangs" (a Thai term for foreigners), the author documents a young man's latest unsuccessful venture in his continual search for true love with foreign women despite the repeated warnings from his mother and best friend. In the final and lengthiest work, "Cockfighter," readers meet Wichian and his family, who all work hard at their menial jobs to build themselves a better life. Wichian, a dabbler in cockfighting, becomes obsessed with the sport and plunges the family into debt. It is in this work that Lapcharoensap's potential as a novelist shines through via an expanded and more complex storyline showing the depth of his characterization. Recommended for all larger collections and essential for libraries serving a Thai American population. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 9/15/04.]-Shirley N. Quan, Orange Cty. P.L., Santa Ana, CA Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Adult/High School-Seven short stories set in Thailand explore the intricacies of modern-day relationships. The overriding themes are not specific to that country, though: each tale focuses on family dynamics and dysfunction. The protagonists in five of the selections are male teens living in or around Bangkok. "Draft Day" addresses the question of loyalty as the narrator allows his parents to bribe an official to keep him from being conscripted. "Sightseeing" tells of a son whose mother is going blind and the ambivalence he feels about living his own life versus caring for her. The last two stories are also first-person narrations, but the voices are different. In "Don't Let Me Die in This Place," an elderly American tries to come to terms-albeit none too gracefully-with his relocation to Thailand to live with his son and Thai daughter-in-law and their "mongrel" children, and "Cockfighting" is told from the perspective of a teen who watches her father become so obsessed with raising roosters that he is blinded to the disintegration of his marriage. In each of the stories, Lapcharoensap offers readers a glimpse of Thailand that they will not find in guidebooks-not only the beauty of this country but also the grit, the overcrowding, and the poverty. More than that, however, he shows with rare wit and insight that coming of age in the world today is a bittersweet and complicated experience regardless of nationality.-Kim Dare, Fairfax County Public Library, VA Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Seven stories, including a couple of prizewinners, from an exuberantly talented young Thai-American writer. In the poignant title story, a young man accompanies his mother to Kok Lukmak, the last in the chain of Andaman Islands-where the two can behave like "farangs," or foreigners, for once. It's his last summer before college, her last before losing her eyesight. As he adjusts to his unsentimental mother's acceptance of her fate, they make tentative steps toward the future. "Farangs," included in Best New American Voices 2005 (p. 711), is about a flirtation between a Thai teenager who keeps a pet pig named Clint Eastwood and an American girl who wanders around in a bikini. His mother, who runs a motel after having been deserted by the boy's American father, warns him about "bonking" one of the guests. "Draft Day" concerns a relieved but guilty young man whose father has bribed him out of the draft, and in "Don't Let Me Die in This Place," a bitter grandfather has moved from the States to Bangkok to live with his son, his Thai daughter-in-law, and two grandchildren. The grandfather's grudging adjustment to the move and to his loss of autonomy (from a stroke) is accelerated by a visit to a carnival, where he urges the whole family into a game of bumper cars. The longest story, "Cockfighter," is an astonishing coming-of-ager about feisty Ladda, 15, who watches as her father, once the best cockfighter in town, loses his status, money, and dignity to Little Jui, 16, a meth addict whose father is the local crime boss. Even Ladda is in danger, as Little Jui's bodyguards try to abduct her. Her mother tells Ladda a family secret about her father's failure of courage in fighting Big Jui to savehis own sister's honor. By the time Little Jui has had her father beaten and his ear cut off, Ladda has begun to realize how she must fend for herself. A newcomer to watch: fresh, funny, and tough. First printing of 50,000; $50,000 ad/promo; author tour. Agent: Amy Williams/Collins McCormick
