Reader's Guide
1. Food means much more than just sustenance in this novel, and no food has richer provenance than pho, according to Hu’ng. What is it about Hu’ng’s pho that draws his devotees?
2. How does Maggie relate to food, and to Vietnamese culture? How is her approach to food and art different from that of the Vietnamese-raised characters like Tu’, Binh and Hu’ng?
3. “What is blood without relationship, without life shared, in any case?” thinks Hu’ng when Binh comes to his defense (p 8). Discuss the meaning of parenthood, love and family in this novel.
4. What is it that caused Hu’ng and Lan to become estranged? Was it just a misunderstanding, or was something else driving them apart?
5. Hu’ng seems to manage a constant state of equanimity, and yet he has his passions, too. How did you feel about him as a character? Has he lived his life well? How would you answer his question in the very last sentence of the novel?
6. Tu’ thinks that “it is humbling to have an Old Man Hu’ng in your life. It makes you want to be a better person.” (p 75) Has someone in your own life inspired that feeling for you?
7. Maggie compares the work of the artist Mindanao, whose work offends Tu’, with the artists in the Beauty of Humanity Movement, who were oppressed by the state (p 167). What do you think of the comparison?
8. What do you think about Maggie’s assertion that Vietnam erases its own history (p 216)? And why is Tu’ embarrassed for her?
9. Mr. Vo became an informant, claiming he gave up an artist to protect the others. “Was I the fool not to play the game?” wonders Hu’ng many years later (p 293). What do you think of his choice, and that of Mr. Vo? What would you have done?
10. Food metaphors abound in this novel. Which was your favourite, and why?
11. Discuss the place for forgiveness—whether granted or not—in the novel.
12. What did you think of Lan’s revelation at the end of the novel, about why she committed the act that made Hu’ng angry for decades? Who injured whom?
13. This novel is written in the third-person omniscient perspective. How did this influence the way the story unfolded? Explore how the story would be different, if told from the perspective of any one of the characters.
14. Is there a particular dish, like Hu’ng’s pho, that resonates in your own life? What is it, and why?
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