My Mother, the Mermaid Chaser
by Jamie Jo Hoang
High School    Crown    384 pp.
9/25    9780593643006    $19.99

In this haunting sequel to My Father, the Panda Killer (rev. 9/23), readers are reacquainted with the complicated Vu family; this time the multilayered story focuses on one San Jose teen’s life-changing Vietnam summer trip while revisiting hardships his estranged refugee mother experienced as a teen during the Vietnam War. Paul, sixteen, travels to Đà Na˘~ng in 2008 with his abusive father to visit his paternal grandmother. Paul is initially ambivalent about the trip since his older sister, Jane (a protagonist in the first novel), bails, and he feels like an outsider. He eventually bonds with a distant cousin and meets his maternal grandmother. The teen then learns more about his mother, Ngo·c Lan, who abandoned the family several years earlier. Alternating chapters from Ngo·c Lan’s point of view cover her own parental abandonment and wrenching sea evacuation, her older sister’s drowning (the titular mermaid), and her struggles to establish a new life in California. Hoang’s dramatic coming-of-age novel is an intense exploration of grief, loss, and multigenerational trauma that ultimately leads to understanding, forgiveness, and even love. Back matter includes a list of professional resources for people dealing with abuse and mental health issues.

From the November/December 2025 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.