Thuận’s first novel to be translated into English from Vietnamese, Chinatown announces the arrival of a major voice in international literary fiction for a whole new readership. We are thrilled to host Thuận at Foyles as she visits London to discuss her lyrical and empathetic work on loss, love and migration.

Thuận, born in Hanoi and settled in Paris, is the author of five novels. Chinatown is her second, and has been translated into English from Vietnamese by Nguyễn An Lý. In 2008, Thuận was awarded the Prize of the Writers’ Union, Vietnamese literature’s most prestigious award.

A book-length monologue, Chinatown tells the life story of a Vietnamese woman living and teaching in the Paris suburbs. A dream-like, immersive telling of the narrator’s childhood in 1980s Hanoi, her student years in Leningrad and time in France, Chinatown unstitches the tragedies and mysteries of one woman’s life. Describing, dreaming and speculating, the narrator moves between the trauma of her husband’s disappearance and the complexities and ironies of life in modern Paris as an immigrant and single mother.

Told in parts through the narrator’s own novel-in-progress, Chinatown asks us what stories we tell ourselves and others about the lives we have lived.

This event will be chaired by writer and editor, Will Forrester. Will is the Translation and International Manager at English PEN, an organisation renowned for championing contemporary literature and the right to freedom of expression around the world. The discussion will be followed by an audience Q&A and a book signing. Doors will open from 6:30pm.

Tickets : £13 Book & Ticket, inc. a copy of Chinatown (RRP £9.99) / £8 General Admission

Venue : The Auditorium (Level 6) at Foyles, 107 Charing Cross Road*

*Please note that the Auditorium at Foyles is fully accessible from the Ground floor lifts.