A story about the complexity of language and family and love, Trung Le Nguyen's writing and art come together to create something lovely and moving.

Tiến is young and gay, and trying to figure out how to come out to his parents. What I loved most about this story was that while Tiến struggles with how to come out, there is only minor homophobic content, and it's a part of the story, not the whole of it. Tiến has friends who love and accept him, and he knows who he is - it's more his worries about his parents accepting him that drive his fear.

The story also focuses on Tiến's mother, who fled Vietnam when she was young. There is a lot of love and care in this family, and she and Tiến's shared love for fairy tales is where I think this graphic novel really shines. The fairy tales they read to each other also get illustrated and written out, interspersed between Tien's story and his mother's story. I especially loved the story of Tấm and Cám, a Vietnamese fairy tale that shares similarities with Cinderella. The Little Mermaid tale in here too was lovely. 

The art in this was quite stunning. While it first appeared to be simple line work, the combination of the clean lines and color choices helped separate each section of the story - Tiến & current day, his mother's life/flashbacks, the fairytales - while still using the same muted tones to tie everything together thematically.

This was truly just lovely. 100% recommended for any reader, but especially tweens and teens who could benefit from seeing a coming out story that is built on a foundation of love.