Thanhha Lai (

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...

: ''Lai T. Thanh Hà''; born January 1, 1965) is a

Vietnamese-American Vietnamese Americans ( vi, Người Mỹ gốc Việt, lit=Viet-origin American people) are Americans of Vietnamese ancestry. They make up about half of all overseas Vietnamese and are the fourth-largest Asian American ethnic group after Chinese ...

writer of

children's literature Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's ...

. She won the 2011 National Book Award for Young People's Literature and a

Newbery Honor Newbery is a surname. People * Chantelle Newbery (born 1977), Australian Olympic diver * David Newbery (born 1943), British economist *Eduardo Newbery (1878–1908), Argentine odontologist and aerostat pilot * Francis Newbery (disambiguation), s ...

for her

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...

, ''

Inside Out & Back Again ''Inside Out & Back Again'' is a verse novel, written in free verse by Thanhha Lai. The book was awarded the 2011 US National Book Award for Young People's Literature and one of the two Newbery Honors. The novel was based on her first year in th ...

'', which was published by

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News ...

Personal life

Lai was born in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City), on January 1, 1965. She has six older brothers. Ten years later, she fled Vietnam during the

Fall of Saigon The Fall of Saigon, also known as the Liberation of Saigon by North Vietnamese or Liberation of the South by the Vietnamese government, and known as Black April by anti-communist overseas Vietnamese was the capture of Ho Chi Minh City, Saigon, t ...

, with her family. She then moved to Alabama and graduated from

University of Texas, Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

with a degree in

journalism Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the " news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation (pro ...

in 1988, and worked for about two years for the

Orange County, California Orange County is located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area in Southern California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 3,186,989, making it the third-most-populous county in California, the sixth-most-populous in the United States, a ...

newspaper ''The Register'', covering news about Little Saigon, the local

community. She earned a Master of Fine Arts from

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, th ...

and moved to New York, where she teaches at

Parsons The New School for Design Parsons School of Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is a private art and design college located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. Founded in 1896 after a group of progressive artists broke away from established Manhat ...

. Today, she goes by Thanhhà Lại on her website and lives in

Croton-on-Hudson Croton-on-Hudson is a village in Westchester County, New York, United States. The population was 8,327 at the 2020 United States census over 8,070 at the 2010 census. It is located in the town of Cortlandt as part of New York City's northern sub ...

."Hà! How former Register reporter Thanhha Lai turned childhood rage into a National Book Award"
Scott Martelle, ''

Orange Coast Magazine ''Orange Coast'' is an American lifestyle magazine published for the Orange County, California region. Established in February 1974, ''Orange Coast'' is the oldest continuously published lifestyle magazine in the region. ''Orange Coast'' inclu ...

'', February 2012. Retrieved 2012-02-02.
Martelle calls it "a groundbreaking 988hire for ''The Register''"."Thanha Lai"
''About the Author'', HarperCollins Publishers.

''Inside Out and Back Again''

Virginia Wolff interviewed Lai for the January 2010 number of ''School Library Journal''. She calls ''Inside Out'' "a powerful story in slender, sinewy prose poems, just a few words in each line." Hà and her family flee home and meet America's "sharp-edged barriers of color, ethnicity, religion, and custom."
(interview),

Virginia Euwer Wolff Virginia Euwer Wolff (born August 25, 1937) is an American author of children's literature. Her award-winning series ''Make Lemonade'' features a 14-year-old girl named LaVaughn, who babysits for the children of a 17-year-old single mother. There ...

, ''

School Library Journal ''School Library Journal'' (''SLJ'') is an American monthly magazine containing reviews and other articles for school librarians, media specialists, and public librarians who work with young people. Articles cover a wide variety of topics, with ...

'', January 1, 2012. Retrieved 2012-02-03. Lai worked for 30 years on an adult novel. In her own words it was " third-person omniscient, spanning 4000 years of Vietnamese history, and whiplashed by hundreds of overly dramatic, showy sentences." The transformation worked when she got "inside the mind of a 10-year-old girl who feels as much as an adult but can’t express the emotions yet, it seemed right to employ a few precise, pungent words and have them explode into real, raw emotions." The fictional girl Hà once says, "No one would believe me, but at times I would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama." The story features her discovery of an adjustment to "the foreign world of Alabama". A review by ''Publishers Weekly'' calls it "especially poignant as she cycles from feeling smart in Vietnam to struggling in the States, and finally regains academic and social confidence.""''Inside Out and Back Again'' by Thanha Lai"
. ''About the Book''. HarperCollins Publishers. Retrieved 2012-02-02. Lai explains, "She felt dumb in Vietnam.... For her, being smart equated to confidence that she could manage her world. That’s why she would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama." In America, the little girl writes, : So this is : what dumb :feels like.

Works

* ''Watermark: Vietnamese American poetry & prose''. Asian American Writers' Workshop. 1998. — anthology including work by Lai * — winner of the

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

"National Book Awards – 2011"

National Book Foundation The National Book Foundation (NBF) is an American nonprofit organization established, "to raise the cultural appreciation of great writing in America". Established in 1989 by National Book Awards, Inc.,Edwin McDowell. "Book Notes: 'The Joy Luc ...

(NBF). Retrieved 2012-04-16.
(With acceptance speech by Lai; interview, reading, and other material replicated for all five Young People's Literature authors and books.)"2011 National Book Award Winner, Young People's Literature"
NBF. Retrieved 2012-01-26.
(Acceptance speech by Lai with some other information.) and one of two runners-up for the

Newbery Medal The John Newbery Medal, frequently shortened to the Newbery, is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), to the author of "the most distinguished cont ...

"Newbery Medal and Honor Books, 1922-Present"

Association for Library Service to Children The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) is a division of the American Library Association, and it is the world's largest organization dedicated to library service to children. Its members are concerned with creating a better future ...

(ALSC).

American Library Association The American Library Association (ALA) is a nonprofit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with 49,727 members ...

(ALA).

"The John Newbery Medal"
ALSC. ALA. Retrieved 2012-04-16. * *
''Hundred Years of Happiness''
HarperCollins. 2022.

References

External links

*
Thanhha Lai Official Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lai, Thanhha 1965 births Living people American children's writers American writers of Vietnamese descent Vietnamese emigrants to the United States Moody College of Communication alumni New York University alumni The New School faculty National Book Award for Young People's Literature winners 21st-century American novelists 21st-century American women writers American women children's writers American women novelists Novelists from New York (state) American women academics

Personal life

''Inside Out and Back Again''

Works

See also

References

External links