Ocean Vuong's sophomore novel, 'The Emperor of Gladness,' delivers

Editor’s note: The Journal kicks off a series of book reviews where New Mexico booksellers share what they are reading.

“The hardest thing in the world is to live only once. But it’s beautiful here, even the ghosts agree.”

— “The Emperor of Gladness,” Ocean Vuong

There’s a reason that “The Emperor of Gladness” is on top lists for best books for 2025. Vuong is known for his New York Times bestselling book, “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous,” and his award-winning poetry. “The Emperor of Gladness” is his sophomore novel and it delivers.

This bighearted novel is about chosen family, unexpected friendships and the stories we tell ourselves in order to survive. The book takes place in East Gladness, Connecticut, where 19-year-old college dropout Hai stands on the edge of a bridge on a rainy night ready to jump off, reminiscent of George Bailey in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Just before he’s about to jump, he hears someone shouting across the river.

He is suddenly approached by the older Lithuanian widow, Grazina, who suffers from dementia but still maintains a quick-wit and biting humor with lines like “You want to be a writer and you want to jump off a bridge? That’s pretty much the same thing, no? A writer just takes longer to hit the water.”

Grazina lives with her own memories and grief as a survivor of war. Grazina and Hai develop a beautiful and unexpected bond after living with her as a caretaker in her dilapidated house crammed with owl trinkets.

Hai also takes a job at a fast-casual chain restaurant called Home Market, where he develops relationships with a crew of East Gladness misfits. The employees at Home Market consists of a 6-foot-3, buzz-cut female manager who aspires to be a pro-wrestler, the “chicken man” who runs the grill, a philosophical cashier whose son died, a skinny nose-ringed, drive-through guy known as Russia, and Hai’s cousin, a Civil War enthusiast, Sony. Their lives are messy but simple, and they all find refuge in the presence of each other.

“These people, bound by nothing but toil in a tiny kitchen that was never truly a kitchen, paid just above minimum wage, their presence known to each other mostly through muscle memory, the shape of their bodies ingrained in the psyche from hours of periphery maneuvering through the narrow counters and back rooms of a fast-food joint designed by a corporate architect, so that they would come to know the sound of each other’s coughs and exhales better than those of their kin and loved ones,” Vuong writes in “The Emperor of Gladness.”

The heartwarming stories in the book will bring you to masterfully woven story lines that tackle life’s difficulties like drug use, disappointments, dementia and aging parents, PTSD and the mundaneness of American life, while simultaneously letting you laugh out loud and embrace the warmth of each character.

Deborah Condit is the owner of Books on the Bosque, located at 6261 Riverside Plaza Lane, Suite A-2, or at booksonthebosque.com.