Cold Thief Place

by Esther Lin

Cold Thief Place speaks of the experiences of an undocumented American, her parents who fled Communist China and found safety in fundamentalist Christianity, and how she tried to understand them and herself by way of confessional poems.

This is a family story. It tells of a mother who fled an authoritarian government and turned that authoritarianism on to her children. Of a father who made a new life—three times on three different continents—and his sea voyage in between. Or what a daughter imagines of these events, as much as it's possible to truly know one's parents. The narrator, who is their daughter, grew up in difficult but very different circumstances, undocumented in the United States and was pressured into a greencard marriage in order to live a "normal life."

One of the myths of America is that Americans are newly formed, defiant of authority, and free from old-world traditions.

This book speaks to dark side of this of the legacies that my parents wished to escape but instead carried with their distrust of government and their desire for an authoritarianism similar to the kind they had fled. Individually, the poems attempt to understand the emotions surrounding these impulses, from the point-of-view of their daughter, who is herself displaced as an undocumented American—that is, a person who is not permitted to be American, and without a home country to return to.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction

100 pages, Paperback

Published March 11, 2025

Reviews

[Ken]

I'm sure Orange Vengeance would be all about this one if he read books. Lots of poems about immigration and being an immigrant, I mean. Even one called "When ICE Came for Me." But Orange Vengeance only reads TV, poorly at that.

For the rest of us, this National Book Award longlist collection provides approachable insight into the humanity of all peoples of the world, no matter where they walk. It also details one tough mom, the source of many a poem by many a poet trying to make sense of her upbringing. The following poem "goes there":


Reading Madame Bovary

That afternoon Bovary went
to the apothecary's closet,

fumbling for arsenic
to draw out her black bile,

make her mouth a hole.
She waited hours for the worst of it,

the shearing of her dark lovely hair--
though for many years

my mother's hair was not lovely
but thin as sagebrush

an autumn fire had passed over.
There are mothers who demand

a price. Youth. Sex organs
without cancer. She said,

You can't know how bad it is.
Bovary's daughter worked in a satin mill.

There is no talk of her beauty.
To say my mother was not beautiful

when she died is merciless.
Today I am without mercy.

[Gregory Duke]

Two samples:

maybe you
were quelling
the latest uprising
that was us
babies
kicking children
unspeaking adults
without
the Little Red Book
the task of
whom to love
and how
could you know
what to do
I was last-born
like so many
last-born daughters
in China Korea Vietnam
in Flushing
we're raised
to be workhorses
well Mother
I'm working now

~~~~~

I have
deformed you
primed much
and painted little
perhaps in the after
you can meet anyone
you can meet
the you I've made
in this poem
you can judge
each other
from afar
then self-love
brings you close
laughter or snort
I don't know
twin of my mother
don't speak to me
anymore

If you don't also find these snippets to be mediocre in their nondescript simplicity, their neglect of formal ingenuity or rigor, and their reliance on clichés and standard notions to exhibit meaning...

Poetry is so underread/undervalued that this gets, like most poetry, automatic four and five star reviews on this site. What is actually remarkable about this? And why is it longlisted for the National Book Award? American poetry is in a bit of a shambolic state, clearly.

[Bant · Rating 5 out of 5]

These were powerful, pointed, and poignant.

[Mya Matteo · Rating 4 out of 5]

intentional, sparse, immediate, unflinching.

[Nuha · Rating 3 out of 5]

it's not hard to see why this collection was nominated for this year's National Book Awards! Esther Lin's Cold Thief Place is a beautifully wrought exploration of undocumented Chinese-American experience. Lin weaves scathing indictment of America's treatment of undocumented folks alongside her own personal history and religious trauma. however, I wish there was more of a thread to follow that wove the collection together more. each individual poem is gorgeous, but I'm not sure what to make of the conversation.

[Courtney LeBlanc · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of poems about identity, illegal immigration, family, duty, trauma, and survival.

from Attachment Theory: "We took turns, the mother demonstrating, / the cub mimicking. How to // hurt a person in the way / they allow. Every person allows / for it, sooner or later. My mother // was my first."

from Illegal Immigration: "Is the absence of a paper / and the presence of a person. // A person with pages and paged / documenting her movements // is a convict. / Or undocumented."

[Nikita Ladd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Day 21 of the Sealey Challenge: I saw her on a panel at Dodge Poetry festival, so it was special to read the whole collection after it came out! This book was so well done, strong and painful. The poems about the mother, and the poems that used language pulled from immigration applications of "petitioner" and "beneficiary," packed a heavy punch. Favorites were "Habit," "Illegal Immigration," and Diagnosis.

[Dree · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic poetry collection. Lin's parents were survivors of China's cultural revolution and immigrants to Brazil, where she was born. The family then moved to the US, and lived as illegal immigrants. These poems address her mother's life in China, her parents' migrations, life as an illegal immigrant, her first marriage (for a green card), her mother's death, and more. Lin's style of poetry is not wordy--it is clipped phrases, repetition, wordplay--this is my favorite kind of poetry, and these poems introduce the reader to her family's story. The Ghost Wife, Cholera is What My Grandfather Did During the War, and the four poems about her first marriage were my favorites--but truly all of them are fantastic.

[DeeSoul · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're looking for new inspiration in confessional poetry, this is it. This time last year I was at my mother's burial after her own diagnosis, so I was intrigued by how the narrative of identity within one's familial unit runs parallel to one's national identity. This book does not speak ill of the dead; it speaks honestly. About ghosts. About borders. About the small things we endure everyday to arrive at the life we wish to live.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a strong and thought provoking collection. It felt incredibly timely. At times, I didn’t feel smart enough to understand it 😅 My favorite poems were the ones about her relationship with her mom, like “Fantasy Novel.” “Illegal Immigration,” the final poem, was also very powerful.

[Julia Bucci]

"It means a ghost, a fiend,
a derogatory term,
my father's preferred
phrase for Americans.
Guí is always
foreign. To return.
To deceive. To overawe.
To be the one who
who overawes.
I write this
without certainty,
to the one
who overawes me."

[Angry.Sad.Motivated · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed this collection immensely.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection about the self and its ties to continents, parents, spouses, and existence.

[The_J · Rating 2 out of 5]

"TELL ME WHERE THE PAST IS."

The collection holds few special pieces.

[Megan]

The Ghost Wife
Listening and Winter
The Badlands

Excellent collection.

[Kayla - the.bookish.mama · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew going into this read that it would be about living undocumented for a time, but I didn’t realize the background of Lin’s story. Her parents fled Communist China to accept and practice a fundamentalist Christian faith when establishing a life in America. Lin was also born in Brazil, and she does an amazing job of articulating belonging to multiple places, whether through our physical location, or the ancestral ties that bind us there. Through this confessional collection the speaker recalls and examines trauma in an unflinching and heartbreaking manner, but the overall collection does not lose its hope. There is an undercurrent of believing in what love can be, not only what it has been. I believe there is strength in vulnerability, and these poems do not turn away from the struggles, but shine a direct light on them, and call them by name. It felt that the speaker was taking their power back, and I was here for it. And the imagery is beautiful. This is such a strong debut!