The Sorrow of War

以越南战争为背景的意识流反战小说，主人公是参加越南战争并幸存的士兵Kien。战争结束了，但战争的创伤却永远无法修复，Kien一直饱受折磨和痛苦，选择把自己的经历诉诸文字。故事在现实与回忆、战争与日常中交织叙述，战争的残酷不仅是身边的队友一个接一个死去，也摧毁了Kien和Phuong青梅竹马的爱情——这段在参战第一天发生，让Kien的理想破灭，影响其一生的悲剧，在小说的最后才逐渐显现。

附两段摘抄，一段是对战争创伤的理解，一段是给曾经美好却遽然破碎的爱情的哀歌。

The sorrow of war inside a soldier’s heart was in a strange way similar to the sorrow of love. It was a kind of nostalgia, like the immense sadness of a world at dusk. It was a sadness, a missing, a pain which could send one soaring back into the past. The sorrow of the battlefield could not normally be pinpointed to one particular event, or even one person. If you focused on any one event it would soon become a tearing pain.

There would be a miracle, he had written. A miracle that would allow people to emerge unchanged from the war. So, despite the horrors of war, despite the cruelties, the humiliations, despite all the ridiculous prejudices and dogma which pervaded everyone’s life, his Phuong would remain young forever. She would be untainted by war. She would be forever beautiful. No one would ever come close to her beauty. She was like a green meadow after spring rains, as fragrant as the flowers in bloom waving against the horizon and waves of fresh grass rustling. She was passionate, untamed, magnetic, with that same miraculous and unfathomable beauty, a beauty that made the heart ache; a vulnerable, innocent beauty forever on the brink of the abyss of destruction. That would be his miracle: Phuong would be untouched, unchanged.

母与子

一本短篇小说集，题目并不贴切，虽然每个故事或多或少出现了母与子，但母子关系基本不是主题。整本集子没有一个出彩的故事，没有值得回味的情节和思考，完全不值一读。

Things in Nature Merely Grow

作者的两个儿子先后选择了同样的方式自杀，这本书不是写给她死去的小儿子，而是作者的一种自我申明和哲学思考。对孩子的成长和教育，作者给予充分的自主权，让他们按自己的天性发展。植物只想活着，但人却会想死，对于孩子的自杀，父母并没有办法，作者痛斥妄加揣测和恶意歪曲的媒体及个人。作者在书中更想表达的是，孩子死了父母还要活着，人死了植物还是继续生长，没有解除痛苦的办法，而是如何与痛苦相处。

米拉蒂

这是一本带着文人自矜的小说，透着一点酸腐和造作的气息。主要人物都是从文革中活下来的，有知识分子的剧作家、画家，有从部队转业的青年女作家（主人公米拉蒂），也有返城的女知青，他们追求的是精神的美，但也受迫于现实，时不时妥协般地展现出丑的一面。他们的精神追求，在中国，最终都失败了，所有人都去了外国，只有画家梁多又从美国回到中国捞金。

我对这本小说的内核是没有意见的，但故事太过冗长，语言也多矫揉，阅读体验一般。