Timber and Lua: Stories

By Vi Khi Nao and Lily Hoang

Timber and Lụa is an experimental collaboration between Lily Ho ng and Vi Khi N o, blending self-translations across Vietlish, Vietnamese, and English to create a unique diasporic literary genre. Comprised of ten short stories, the collection explores a range of styles from love stories to speculative fiction and fairy tales. These stories reflect themes of generational trauma, identity, and cultural clash, offering a dynamic, eccentric range of narratives: love stories woven through fragmented memories, a blend of folklore and fantasy, Vietnamese-American identities reimagined in a post-apocalyptic world, and an exploration of how meaning transforms in self-translation. Similar to Samuel Beckett and Vladimir Nabokov, who translated their own work (from English to French and from Russian to English, respectively), Ho ng and N o extend that makeshift "tradition" by hybridizing their translation to graft the genetic material of one language (English) and the genetic material of another language (Vietnamese) to produce a new literary diasporic genre. Timber and Lụa coincides with the fiftieth anniversary of the Fall of Saigon (1975-2025), as a diasporic literary contribution and commemorative celebration.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1636284337
• ISBN13: 9781636284330
• Release Date: November 2025
• Publisher: Red Hen Press
• Length: 304 Pages