Oprah’s Book Club Pick
Ocean Vuong returns with a compassionate novel about chosen family, unexpected friendships, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.“Stunning… a sincere and powerful look at people living on the margins of society and the unique challenges they face in surviving and thriving.”
— Oprah Winfrey
“Magnificent… In writing this book, Vuong may have joined the elite ranks of a small number of great novelists.”
— Leigh Haber, Los Angeles Times
The hardest thing in the world is to live only once…On a late summer evening in the post-industrial town of East Gladness, Connecticut, nineteen-year-old Hai stands at the edge of a bridge in a downpour, ready to jump, when he hears someone shouting from across the river. The voice belongs to Grazyna, an elderly widowed woman living with dementia, who persuades him to turn back. Grieving and with nowhere to go, he soon becomes her caregiver.Over the course of a year, this unlikely pair forges a life-altering bond rooted in empathy, spiritual reckoning, and heartbreak—one with the power to transform Hai’s relationship with himself, his family, and his marginalized community.Moving through the cycles of history, memory, and time, The Emperor of Joy reveals the profound ways in which love, labor, and loneliness form the bedrock of American life. At its core, it is a brave epic about what it means to exist on society’s edges and to confront the trauma that haunts our collective soul.Vuong’s signature hallmarks—formal innovation, syntactic virtuosity, and the ability to weave courage with grace through tenderness—are on full display in this story of loss, hope, and how far we will go for one of life’s most fleeting mercies: a second chance.
Book & Literature
- Full Title: The Emperor of Joy
- Author: Ocean Vuong
- Genre: Adult, Contemporary, Fiction, LGBT, Literary Fiction, Poetry, Queer
- ISBN: 9780593831878
- ASIN: 059383187X
- Language: English
- Publication Date: May 13, 2025
- PDF File Size: 3.6 MB
- EPUB File Size: 9.1 MB
Critical Reception
“Vuong’s protagonist Hai is a drug-addicted college dropout living in the fictional Connecticut town of East Gladness. He forms an unexpected bond with an elderly Lithuanian widow and moves into her home. He later takes a job at HomeMarket, a fast-food restaurant where all the employees, like him, are searching for a place to belong. The novel brims with compassion for these characters, who are scorned by society yet very much a part of it.”
— The New Yorker
“Exquisite… A celebrated poet, Vuong fills his pages with arresting sentences, often infused with the wisdom and brevity of a philosopher… In writing The Emperor of Joy, Vuong may have earned his place among a small circle of great novelists, yet his vision remains rooted in the Connecticut town where he began writing.”
— Leigh Haber, Los Angeles Times
“On the surface, The Emperor of Joy is about how people on the margins endure hardship, but it is also about how contradictions can coexist. War and loss run through every page, as do love and joy. Alienation permeates the entire novel, yet it celebrates profound connection… tender and at times devastating.”
— The Seattle Times
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