Over the Moat Love Among the Ruins of Imperial Vietnam [Paperback]

In the fall of 1992, James Sullivan travels to Vietnam to bicycle from Saigon to Hanoi. He has just finished graduate school and has an assignment to write a magazine story about a country that is still subject to a U.S. trade embargo. But in Hue, the old imperial capital of Vietnam, the planned three-month bike trip takes a detour. Here, in a city spliced by the famed Perfume River and filled with French baroque villas, he finds himself bicycling over a moat to visit a beautiful shop girl who lives amid the ruins of the last imperial dynasty of Vietnam. She falls for him, but there's a catch. Several other suitors are vying for her hand, and one of them is an official with the city's police force.Over the Moatis the story of Sullivan's efforts to win Thuy's favor while immersing himself in Vietnamese culture, of kindly insinuating himself in Thuy's colorful and warm family, and of learning how to create a common language based on love and understanding.

Cultures clash, but love conquers, with some fascinating twists and plenty of intimate details. Kirkus Reviews

Over the Moattells a tale we sorely need to hear at this moment in history...Elegantly written, redolent of our universal humanity, this is an important book. Robert Olen Butler, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Good Scent From a Strange Mountain

What a wonderful premise for a novel. ButOver the Moatisn't fiction: it's a true story. Sullivan's tenacity, passion, luck, and the purity of his love come through in his prose, and he has succeeded admirably both in the telling of this story and in the living of it. Abraham Verghese, author of My Own Country

Over the Moattakes the reader on a whirlwind tour of the country and the culture, never letting us forget that, as Americans, we're just visitors. Stewart O'Nan, author of The Names of the Dead and editor of The Vietnam Reader

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