The Land I Lost: Adventures of a Boy in Vietnam – An ALA Notable Memoir About Jungle Wildlife and Highlands Life for Kids (Ages 8-12)

by Quang Nhuong Huynh, Vo-Dinh Mai (Illustrator)

An ALA Notable Children’s Book and a Booklist Editors’ Choice, about one young man’s memories of the land he called home.

The land I love was lost to me forever.

Huynh Quang Nhuong grew up in the highlands of Vietnam, next to the jungle teeming with wildlife. Encounters with tigers, wild hogs, and deadly snakes were as much a part of his life as tending the rice fields while on the back of his pet water buffalo, Tank.

Perfect for classrooms, as well as fans of Linda Sue Park and Thanhha Lai, these fifteen tales will transport readers into a world of lush beauty and terrible danger—and a way of life that is gone forever.

Genres: Nonfiction, School, Biography, Asia, Childrens, History, Memoir

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

Reviews

[Carolyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This middle schoolers book is a true account of a boy's childhood in Vietnam. His very poor family lives in a hamlet with other families and each day is one of pure survival. The sweet story of a pet water buffalo named Tank, stories of monkeys, snakes, fish, and otters, I learned some exquisitely interesting things I had never even heard of.

Beware as there are two stories in particular that might not be suitable for sensitive children. A monkey steals a hatchet and butchers a sleeping two-year-old child, for instance. I read it to my fifth-grader and we talked about it. A good discussion on wild animals and man's historic attempt to tame them. (There are several other Instances of horrific deaths as well.)

I am glad I read this book. The author has an Ernest Hemingway quality of speaking volumes in just a few words. I would recommend this book to a Junior High age boy who likes animals and adventure. It is short and easy to read. The story ends with the arrival of the French and Ho Chi Minh's troops near the boy's own hamlet.

[Sarah B · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book tonight and I found it a real pleasure! Although it states these are the adventures of the author when he was a boy (??) it very often reads like fairy tales. There is that same feeling to the tales somehow, danger and enchantment and being very wise to outsmart something. And animals! There are so many animals in here!

Water buffaloes, snakes, monkeys, birds, tigers, crocs, otters and fish... I just loved all of these animal related tales of a far away exotic land. And by reading these I somehow felt I had actually known Tank the water buffalo. He became real. So did the others.

And like faerie tales, these are adventure stories. Simple adventures that involve animals but the danger is often very real. Deadly snakes, nasty pigs that can kill you, crocs and venomous snakes! And the monkeys! They can be so nasty too!

My only complaint is often I am left feeling a tad confused by what animal is the author writing about? Because in a few tales the nickname of a creature is used. I have figured out that the "horse snake" is a green colored pit viper. But what about the "unfaithful bird"? Which bird is it? It makes me ponder if the author himself doesn't know. But life in Vietnam is far different than anything I know and these tales bring the country to life in full vivid color through lively descriptions!

I also liked sometimes the stories took an unexpected turn. This book is a definite keeper!

[Steven Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew Nhuong when I lived in Columbia Mo, and enjoyed his delightful book about growing up in Vietnam and the way he made so much come to life, showing a picture of Vietnam we don't normally see. He was especially fond of 'Tank', the buffalo, and when he described all of these stories (and many more) in person, Nhuong was very engaging. He also wrote several children's plays about Vietnam and its legends.
He always liked to write in Lowry Plaza (the main campus square) in his wheelchair with a writing desk attached to it. When I wrote my first novel, The Green Path, I based a character init upon Nhuong, and dedicated the book to him.
A happy, wonderful storyteller who wrote an enjoyable book, all of it masking his own personal tragedy in his country, which he never stopped loving.

[Siobhain · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. After reading it, I remember thinking that Vietnam as Huynh Quang Nhoung had known it was not just the land he lost. It is a land and time that we all lost, a land of families living in community together, working together. A time of extended families and shared stories. It tells of a lifestyle touched by real life - snakes, buffalo, hogs, monkeys, people, rice plants, the jungle, and more. I can't imagine giving up my air-conditioned technological world, yet we are missing a richness in our world that is present in this book. Thanks to Mr. Nhuong for sharing his world with us, dangers, superstitions and all.

[Zahra Labbafan · Rating 3 out of 5]

کتاب رو نشر مفید با ترجمه ع صابری به اسم سرزمین گمشده سالیان پیش چاپ کرده
از اولین کتاب هایی که برای خواهر و برادر بزرگترم بود و من در دوران ابتدایی خوندم
داستان های واقعی از یک نوجوان ویتنامی که بیشتر در مورد خرافات و اعتقادات قدیمی ها یا حیوانات وحشی و اهلی اطراف روستایشان هست و چگونه زندگی و زنده ماندن در کنار این حیات وحش
این چند روز دوباره کتاب رو خوندم و برای یادآوری روزهای قدیمی ام خوب بود

[Amy de Raaf]

An exciting children’s novel set in the highlands of Vietnam 🇻🇳. Could not read this one fast enough, so many suspenseful stories filled with wild native animals and scary adventures!

[Jia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Land i Lost: Adventures of a Boy in Vietnam( Harper Trophy Book) 4/19/09

By Quang Nhuong Huynh

Have you ever visited Vietnam and experienced the life that the farmers did? Huynh Quang Nhoung had faced it all and he wrote this story with his own point of view. Huynh Quang Nhoung had faced many great adventures with his water buffalo, Tank and they had create a strong bond within each others.
Huynh Quang Nhoung was a boy who would do a lot of farm work and he interact with the nature most of the time during his childhood. The book illustrates all the events that Huynh Quang Nhoung had faced right before the war of Vietnam. The book show deep emotions and feelings for a boy that faces many obstacles at a young age.
What might happen between Tank and Huynh Quang Nhoung? How much work does Huynh Quang Nhoung does do a day? All the information could be found once you read the book. I recommend this book to anyone that likes to interact with nature.

[Skedatt · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating and enjoyable biography about pre-war Vietnam. I enjoyed reading about how the village interacted with each other and with the animals of the jungle. The story about the newly wed couple and the crocodile was very memorable.

Be prepared to talk to children about cultural differences and animal cruelty. It is a great conversation starter, but you might want to preview it before handing it over to your child if you have issue with such things. :)

To clarify, it wasn't attaching knives to the water buffaloes horns to fight off tigers, but rather the incident that they would catch wild chickens and coat them in clay and throw them in the fire until they were cooked. It was the comment about watching their eyes as they died that rather disturbed me. Growing up on a farm myself, the very idea of doing that to a creature is really gross. When you kill, you kill quickly so that they don't suffer.

[Bree Bosse · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought this book was going to be more interesting than it ended up being. It was a good book without a doubt, however I was not a fan of vignette layout of the book because it was several mini stories. This gave a nice preview and visual of the author's culture in Vietnam, however it did not leave me wanting more everytime I sat down the book. It was a good example of a memoir and really showed the Vietnam Culture from when the author was a young boy.

[Mark Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a beautiful set of stories from a long-past era in Vietnamese history, the early 1950s. It's about a boy growing up in a rural village and his wild adventures with animals and humans. In 2017 we can in no way experience what the boy does but it's enlightening and adventurous to see how people lived and what happened to them at that time and in that area. The book can be read in any order, each chapter stands on its own and is a pleasure from start to finish.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book, very informative. We learned a lot about life in pre-war Vietnam. However, I don’t believe this book is appropriate for very young children or very sensitive children. There are a few stories that are very brutally honest about jungle village life.

[Ejayen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am glad I do not live in Vietnam. It is very interesting. I would describe it as a memoir of an upper middle class farming family. For the most part it is a tale about the adventures of the family's animals.

[Bethany W · Rating 5 out of 5]

I jokingly said this book could also be titled: Fifteen Ways Animals In Vietnam Can Kill You.

The Land I Lost is a collection of stories written as a memoir by the author. The book paints a clear picture of every day village life in the jungle of Vietnam before the Vietnam War era.

Among the animals that could kill you:
Water Buffalo
Horse Snake
Crocodile
Two Step Snake
Wild Boar
Monkeys

In reading The Land I Lost one becomes acutely aware of the mortality and frailty of jungle life. Death is a constant fixture. However, the bond of community within the presence of constant death is beautiful and profound. Knowing that death could happen at any time, the villagers work together to support and protect one another.

When a horse snake shows up and stalks the villagers, you feel the fear of ferocity of the snake — but also the communal resolve to work together to keep everyone safe. The wild boar (tusks that rip flesh open) and horse snake (a fast moving snake with poisonous bite - think green mamba meets large python that can outpace a running person with lightning speed) are the apex dangers of the jungle, requiring 20+ men to kill.

But interspersed in the moments of danger come touching moments of mundanity. Training a monkey to fetch coconuts. Feeding birds. Tending to rice paddies. Conversations with family. While danger is ever present, one rests securely in the love and safety of both the community and one’s family.

[Candice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nhuong’s book gives us a window into a world that few will ever experience. He tells us the stories he lived as a child in his small hamlet in the mountains of Vietnam. Nature has more teeth in those mountains as many dangerous animals lived just beyond the walls, and sometimes in the walls, of their homes.

We learned so much about the habits of the new-to-us animals, but there was a surprising darkness in many of these stories too. One common theme was addicting animals such as birds or monkeys to opium so that you could better train them or keep them from leaving you. My stomach turned a bit reading this to my kids, but it gave us lots of opportunities for discussion.

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember reading this book as a middle school librarian in the early '80s and being fascinated by it, so after visiting Vietnam, I decided to read it again.

And I am glad I did. This is a simple remembrance of an interesting childhood in the Highlands of Vietnam during the 50's. The boy's encounters with crocodiles, eels, fish, wild boars, and lots of snakes make up most of the narrative, but glimpses of village life and beliefs also make the story quite interesting. Young readers, especially those who like to hunt or fish, may find the book of interest.

Oh, not for PETA members.

[Sarah Bowling · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this memoir about growing up in a hamlet in Vietnam. He tells stories of his childhood and you learn about the culture, land, and animals of Vietnam in a simple, but interesting way.

CC: mentions joking about “the wedding night” but doesn’t go into any detail, some pretty gory details about death by wild animals or killing dangerous animals, opium addiction including purposely getting animals addicted

[Erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

We read this with our geography study. Crazy and wildly entertaining!

[Lindsay · Rating 4 out of 5]

We really enjoyed this book and learned so much about Vietnam. That said there is one very disturbing chapter involving a monkey. Preview if you have sensitive kids.

[Mark Roman]

Very good, Interesting but I felt like the ending was really sudden and stopped really quickly. But besides that it was a very interesting book that I felt like I could read over a few more times

[Jack C · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Very good book with a
sad ending

[Kristine Rogers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pre- reading for home school. Skipping some chapters because they are very heavy or slightly mature for 4th grader.

[Alexis Carlson · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s crazy to think that there are people alive today who still remember a world like this. We tend to imagine it as distant history.

[Katt Hansen · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was never more glad to have a book over and done with. We read this one as part of my daughter's school curriculum, but the stories seemed to have little point other than to underscore again and again that life is brutal, people and animals die all the time, and that what is funny to one person is decidedly not to another.

Just not exactly my cup of tea and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

If I had read this book with my son I'm not sure my reaction would have been much different. I thought the final story would somehow tie together the other stories, declare a theme, give me some idea why he lost this land and what happened to the narrator. Instead the bull died and the story ended. Just like that. We were left somewhat shaken, jarred even by the ending. Finally we just looked at each other, said, "That's that," and put the book right back on the shelf.

I'm not using this book with the next child on the list. We got an interesting look at life in Vietnam, but I don't think what we gained is worth some of what we endured in reading this.

[Amanda Harrison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Winner of a number of awards including the William Allen White, the Library of Congress Children’s book award, and the ALA Notable Children’s Book Award, The Land I Lost offers a portrait of Vietnam before the Vietnam War. While clearly an award winner from the 1980’s the book has less appeal with both a dated appearance and stories that hearken back to a more violent kid’s culture.
Nhuong’s stories about Vietnam are told in 15 short chapters that tie together briefly, but don’t come together in a notable conclusion. Ultimately, the theme that ties this book together is one of death and loss, as almost every chapter includes the death of adult, child, or animal.
While many children’s stories romanticize the past, this one offers a honest, if somewhat depressing view the Vietnam era. The ending of the book, at the beginning of the Vietnam War is aptly named, Sorrow. Front matter of the book tells the story of how Nhuong always wished to return home. This book is titled accurately, The Land I Lost.

[Katherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of jungle adventures from the childhood of a man who grew up in Vietnam. Dangers were so great that each hut was surrounded by a trench, with bamboo poles to cross it, which were pulled in at night. Having grown up in the Mojave Desert myself, with many dangerous creatures in the landscape, I could identify a bit, though dangers of the jungle seem far greater. It is a quick read composed of several short (or very short) stories. It's classified as a children's book, but I hesitate to recommend it as such. I would read some of the tales aloud to kids, but others I felt really require a mature reader. There's a fair amount of carnage in battles with dangerous beasts, and in once case an infant is hacked to pieces in its cradle by a monkey with a knife. Two of the stories recommend addicting an animal to opium in order to subjugate it, and explain how this could be accomplished. I'm thinking that in this day, it would not have been published for children.

[Julie · Rating 1 out of 5]

The first half of the book was great. My kids & I were really enjoying the book. Then, the story of a bridegroom started. On his wedding night, he died. There had been a venomous snake in his bed and he breathed in the deadly vapors. That part wasn't too graphic so we just sort-of paused and carried on. Then the story about catching wild hogs started. The farmers sent their beloved dogs in to try wear out the hog and several dogs were tore apart. The book discussed training the "unfaithful bird" by getting it addicted to opium. It discussed the pleasant feeling opium gave. One night, as it was time for the birds to come back to the house, a storm came and all the birds died. Then came the hog butcher that had a monkey. The monkey watched him. One night the butcher and his wife left their 2 year asleep with the monkey there. The monkey broke out of his chain and dismembered the child. We stopped reading after this. Maybe this is true to life but this was a pretty scary book for kids.

[Andre · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a nice little compillation of stories from the author's childhood showing a range or happy and sad stories. It was easy and entertaining to read, never felt boring and had a lot of suspense. However it is more something to calm down then to really get hyped by or because of it. Now I can't really write anything more without going into spoiler territory, so lets go to the few flaws of the book:
1) The writing is ok, but maybe a slightly bigger vocabulary would have been good.
2) I think there could be some translation errors since the author speaks about racoons being in Vietnam instead of racoons dogs.
3) Some elements of the story seem a bit far fatched and so I started to wonder about the credibility of the stories.

But apart from these three flaws I think the book is generally worth reading,

[Timothyl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This belongs to the plethora of books I gobbled up as a homeschooler. I can count on my fingers the books that I've read more than once, and this is one of them. The book carries with it a sense of amusement in the face of an extremely dangerous jungle; it seemed as though not a chapter could go by (and it's a very short book) in which therein was not a life claimed by the dire wilderness. Snakes, Boars, Crocodiles, etc. plagued the hamlet in which the drama is set.

Our very likeable hero and his relatives show just how incapable American kids are these days. Their bad-ass waterbuffalo, Tank, who is very much a character in the short book is one of the coolest non-humans I've ever read about in a book.

Spoiler alert: the book ends in sadness, adding to how real and gritty the whole thing feels. One of the coolest little stories I've read in my 15 years.

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Somehow, I expected more from a book about the author's childhood in Vietnam. The individual story chapters are interesting, especially since they reveal some fascinating details about a distant (to me) culture. I just didn't find the depth or even breadth I was hoping for as Nhuong revisits his childhood. I kept waiting for him to more fully weave his reminiscences with incidents of the war and his subsequent losses.

Also, I was a bit surprised at some of the harshness and mildly "adult" situations included in a few of these childhood stories, otherwise written primarily for a young audience.

I preferred WATER BUFFALO DAYS by the same author, perhaps because its purpose was clearly to tell the story of Nhuong's boyhood relationship with Tank, one of the family's water buffalo.

[Tracy · Rating 2 out of 5]

UGH! If you don't mind killing of some human or some animal throughout the whole boo, even though culturally correct, go ahead and read this book. We read this book as a part of Eastern Hemisphere history. The setting is Vietnam during the war. If you can get past the gore of this book, it tells the story of of a young mans encounter with many animals in his hamlet. We see a little bit of the culture and their beliefs and superstitions.
The book is listed as ages 7 - 10. Maybe the reading LEVEL is that, but, I'm not sure I would read this to a 7 year old due to content. Daughter was 11 at the time.
Please read other reviews for spoilers. I won't list them here.