Straining Forward: Minh Phuong Towner's Story

In the early morning hours of January 31, 1968, New Year fireworks gave way to gunfire and bombs. Eleven-year-old Minh watched in horror as her father and two siblings were gunned down by the Vietcong in their backyard. Though she escaped death that night, abuse, prison, and torture would follow. A dramatic escape by boat on the South China Sea finally takes Minh out of communist Vietnam, but the tragedy of her childhood would continue to haunt her.

From France to Australia to the United Sta...