Eric Nguyen, author of a new book titled Things We Lost to the Water, will discuss his book at 6 p.m. on Monday, June 28, via video conference online.

Visit www.jplibrary.net/adults for more details, including how to join the discussion. The presentation also can be accessed through the library’s Facebook page, www.facebook.com/jeffparishlibrary.

This event is free of charge; registration is not required.

This event is co-sponsored by the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival, an annual five-day literary festival in the city of New Orleans. The festival is dedicated to the Pulitzer Prize-winning American playwright Tennessee Williams. Every year, it features several events related to the long career of Williams, as well as writing workshops, panel discussions, literary readings, stage performances, a book fair, music, writing contests, and other events related to American literature, poetry, drama, opera, film, photography, art, history, culture, and cooking. The signature event is the Stella and Stanley Shouting Contest that closes the festival.

Things We Lost to the Water is the story of Hương who arrives in New Orleans with her two young sons. She is jobless, homeless, and worried about her husband, Công, who remains in Vietnam. As she and her boys begin to settle in to life in America, she continues to send letters and tapes to Công, hopeful that they will be reunited and her children will grow up with a father.

But with time, Hương realizes she will never see her husband again. While she copes with this loss, her sons, Tuấn and Běnh grow up in their absent father’s shadow, haunted by a man and a country trapped in their memory and imagination. As they push forward, the three adapt to life in America in different ways: Hương takes up with a Vietnamese car salesman who is also new in town; Tuấn tries to connect with his heritage by joining a local Vietnamese gang; and Běnh, now going by Ben, embraces his adopted homeland and his burgeoning sexuality. Their search for identity–as individuals and as a family–threatens to tear them apart. But then disaster strikes the city they now call home, and they must find a new way to come together and honor the ties that bind them.

Eric Nguyen earned a master of fine arts degree in Creative Writing from McNeese State University, Lake Charles, Louisiana. He has been awarded fellowships from Lambda Literary, Voices of Our Nation Arts, and the Tin House Writers Workshop. He is the editor-in-chief of diaCRITICS.org. He lives in Washington, D.C. Things We Lost to the Water is his first novel.

For more information regarding this event, contact Chris Smith, Manager of Adult Programming for the library, at 504-889-8143 or wcsmith@jefferson.lib.la.us.