
Em
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $18.86
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Kim Thúy
-
By:
-
Kim Thúy
About this listen
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2021 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE
Kim Thúy's Em is a virtuosic novel of profound power and sensitivity, and an enduring affirmation of the greatest act of resistance: love.
In the midst of war, an ordinary miracle: an abandoned baby tenderly cared for by a young boy living on the streets of Saigon. The boy is Louis, the child of a long-gone American soldier. Louis calls the baby em Hồng, em meaning "little sister," or "beloved." Even though her cradle is nothing more than a cardboard box, em Hồng's life holds every possibility.
Through the linked destinies of a family of characters, the novel takes its inspiration from historical events, from Operation Babylift, which evacuated thousands of biracial orphans from Saigon in April 1975, to the remarkable growth of the nail salon industry, dominated by Vietnamese expatriates all over the world. From the rubber plantations of Indochina to the massacre at My Lai, Kim Thúy sifts through the layers of pain and trauma in stories we thought we knew, revealing transcendent moments of grace and the invincibility of the human spirit.
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Mãn
- By: Kim Thúy
- Narrated by: Kim Thúy
- Length: 3 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mãn has three mothers: the one who gives birth to her in wartime, the nun who plucks her from a vegetable garden, and her beloved Maman, who becomes a spy to survive. Seeking security for her grown daughter, Maman finds Mãn a husband - a lonely Vietnamese restaurateur who lives in Montreal. Thrown into a new world, Mãn discovers her natural talent as a chef. Gracefully she practices her art, with food as her medium. She and her husband seem to drift along, respectfully and dutifully. But when she encounters a married chef in Paris, everything changes in the instant of a fleeting touch....
-
-
Reminds me of Marguerite Duras
- By Jessica Smith on 06-05-21
By: Kim Thúy
-
The Mountains Sing
- By: Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai
- Narrated by: Quyen Ngo
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner's In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North.
-
-
Incredible first English language novel
- By Gregory Barbee on 03-23-20
-
The Feather Thief
- Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century
- By: Kirk Wallace Johnson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews
- Length: 8 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a cool June evening in 2009, after performing a concert at London's Royal Academy of Music, 20-year-old American flautist Edwin Rist boarded a train for a suburban outpost of the British Museum of Natural History. Home to one of the largest ornithological collections in the world, the Tring museum was full of rare bird specimens whose gorgeous feathers were worth staggering amounts of money to the men who shared Edwin's obsession: the Victorian art of salmon fly-tying. Once inside the museum, the champion fly-tier grabbed hundreds of bird skins - some collected 150 years earlier.
-
-
Unusual and true natural history mystery!
- By Sylvia on 04-28-18
-
How to Pronounce Knife
- Stories
- By: Souvankham Thammavongsa
- Narrated by: James Tang, Kulap Vilaysack
- Length: 2 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the title story of Souvankham Thammavongsa's debut collection, a young girl brings a book home from school and asks her father to help her pronounce a tricky word, a simple exchange with unforgettable consequences. Thammavongsa is a master at homing in on moments like this—moments of exposure, dislocation, and messy feeling that push us right up against the limits of language.
-
-
Thought provoking great little listen with sexual
- By McSusie on 09-29-20
-
Stay with Me
- A Novel
- By: Ayobami Adebayo
- Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Yejide and Akin have been married since they met and fell in love at university. Though many expected Akin to take several wives, he and Yejide have always agreed: Polygamy is not for them. But four years into their marriage - after consulting fertility doctors and healers, trying strange teas and unlikely cures - Yejide is still not pregnant. She assumes she still has time - until her family arrives on her doorstep with a young woman they introduce as Akin's second wife.
-
-
Do better
- By Adetoun Kolapo on 01-29-18
By: Ayobami Adebayo
-
What Comes After
- A Novel
- By: JoAnne Tompkins
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins, Kristen DiMercurio, Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In misty, coastal Washington State, Isaac lives alone with his dog, grieving the recent death of his teenage son, Daniel. Next door, Lorrie, a working single mother, struggles with a heinous act committed by her own teenage son. Separated by only a silvery stretch of trees, the two parents are emotionally stranded, isolated by their great losses - until an unfamiliar 16-year-old girl shows up, bridges the gap, and changes everything.
-
-
Thin story line, too long.
- By Sandra Crews on 11-04-21
By: JoAnne Tompkins
-
Mãn
- By: Kim Thúy
- Narrated by: Kim Thúy
- Length: 3 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mãn has three mothers: the one who gives birth to her in wartime, the nun who plucks her from a vegetable garden, and her beloved Maman, who becomes a spy to survive. Seeking security for her grown daughter, Maman finds Mãn a husband - a lonely Vietnamese restaurateur who lives in Montreal. Thrown into a new world, Mãn discovers her natural talent as a chef. Gracefully she practices her art, with food as her medium. She and her husband seem to drift along, respectfully and dutifully. But when she encounters a married chef in Paris, everything changes in the instant of a fleeting touch....
-
-
Reminds me of Marguerite Duras
- By Jessica Smith on 06-05-21
By: Kim Thúy
-
The Mountains Sing
- By: Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai
- Narrated by: Quyen Ngo
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner's In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North.
-
-
Incredible first English language novel
- By Gregory Barbee on 03-23-20
-
The Feather Thief
- Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century
- By: Kirk Wallace Johnson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews
- Length: 8 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a cool June evening in 2009, after performing a concert at London's Royal Academy of Music, 20-year-old American flautist Edwin Rist boarded a train for a suburban outpost of the British Museum of Natural History. Home to one of the largest ornithological collections in the world, the Tring museum was full of rare bird specimens whose gorgeous feathers were worth staggering amounts of money to the men who shared Edwin's obsession: the Victorian art of salmon fly-tying. Once inside the museum, the champion fly-tier grabbed hundreds of bird skins - some collected 150 years earlier.
-
-
Unusual and true natural history mystery!
- By Sylvia on 04-28-18
-
How to Pronounce Knife
- Stories
- By: Souvankham Thammavongsa
- Narrated by: James Tang, Kulap Vilaysack
- Length: 2 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the title story of Souvankham Thammavongsa's debut collection, a young girl brings a book home from school and asks her father to help her pronounce a tricky word, a simple exchange with unforgettable consequences. Thammavongsa is a master at homing in on moments like this—moments of exposure, dislocation, and messy feeling that push us right up against the limits of language.
-
-
Thought provoking great little listen with sexual
- By McSusie on 09-29-20
-
Stay with Me
- A Novel
- By: Ayobami Adebayo
- Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Yejide and Akin have been married since they met and fell in love at university. Though many expected Akin to take several wives, he and Yejide have always agreed: Polygamy is not for them. But four years into their marriage - after consulting fertility doctors and healers, trying strange teas and unlikely cures - Yejide is still not pregnant. She assumes she still has time - until her family arrives on her doorstep with a young woman they introduce as Akin's second wife.
-
-
Do better
- By Adetoun Kolapo on 01-29-18
By: Ayobami Adebayo
-
What Comes After
- A Novel
- By: JoAnne Tompkins
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins, Kristen DiMercurio, Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In misty, coastal Washington State, Isaac lives alone with his dog, grieving the recent death of his teenage son, Daniel. Next door, Lorrie, a working single mother, struggles with a heinous act committed by her own teenage son. Separated by only a silvery stretch of trees, the two parents are emotionally stranded, isolated by their great losses - until an unfamiliar 16-year-old girl shows up, bridges the gap, and changes everything.
-
-
Thin story line, too long.
- By Sandra Crews on 11-04-21
By: JoAnne Tompkins
-
The House of Doors
- By: Tan Twan Eng
- Narrated by: David Oakes, Louise-Mai Newberry
- Length: 11 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year is 1921. Lesley Hamlyn and her husband, Robert, a lawyer and war veteran, are living at Cassowary House on the Straits Settlement of Penang. When “Willie” Somerset Maugham, a famed writer and old friend of Robert’s, arrives for an extended visit with his secretary Gerald, the pair threatens a rift that could alter more lives than one. Maugham, one of the great novelists of his day, is beleaguered: Having long hidden his homosexuality, his unhappy and expensive marriage of convenience becomes unbearable after he loses his savings—and the freedom to travel with Gerald.
-
-
Great, but no “Garden”
- By Susan on 10-30-23
By: Tan Twan Eng
-
Foster
- By: Claire Keegan
- Narrated by: Aoife McMahon
- Length: 1 hr and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is a hot summer in rural Ireland. A child is taken by her father to live with relatives on a farm, not knowing when or if she will be brought home again. In the Kinsellas' house, she finds an affection and warmth she has not known and slowly, in their care, begins to blossom. But there is something unspoken in this new household—where everything is so well tended to—and this summer must soon come to an end.
-
-
A story that will stay with me a long time
- By CTKG on 11-01-22
By: Claire Keegan
-
The House of the Spirits
- A Novel
- By: Isabel Allende
- Narrated by: Thom Rivera, Marisol Ramirez
- Length: 18 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The House of the Spirits brings to life the triumphs and tragedies of three generations of the Trueba family. The patriarch Esteban is a volatile, proud man whose voracious pursuit of political power is tempered only by his love for his delicate wife, Clara, a woman with a mystical connection to the spirit world. When their daughter, Blanca, embarks on a forbidden love affair in defiance of her implacable father, the result is an unexpected gift to Esteban.
-
-
Narrators spoil it
- By Cookie on 09-27-16
By: Isabel Allende
-
Midnight's Children
- By: Salman Rushdie
- Narrated by: Lyndam Gregory
- Length: 24 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Salman Rushdie holds the literary world in awe with a jaw-dropping catalog of critically acclaimed novels that have made him one of the world's most celebrated authors. Winner of the prestigious Booker of Bookers, Midnight's Children tells the story of Saleem Sinai, born on the stroke of India's independence.
-
-
Outstanding book, superb narration
- By MarcS on 06-09-09
By: Salman Rushdie
-
Strange Sally Diamond
- By: Liz Nugent
- Narrated by: Jessica Regan, Stephen Hogan, Sara Lynam, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Reclusive Sally Diamond is thrust into the media spotlight when she tries to incinerate her dead father, causing widespread outrage. Now she’s the center of attention, not only from hungry reporters and police detectives, but also a sinister voice from a past she does not remember. As she begins to discover the repressed memories of her horrific early childhood, Sally steps into the world for the first time, making new friends, big decisions, and learning that people don’t always mean what they say.
-
-
Kept me listening.
- By Amazon Customer on 11-06-23
By: Liz Nugent
-
The Japanese Lover
- By: Isabel Allende
- Narrated by: Joanna Gleason
- Length: 9 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1939, as Poland falls under the shadow of the Nazis, young Alma Belasco's parents send her away to live in safety with an aunt and uncle in their opulent mansion in San Francisco. There, as the rest of the world goes to war, she encounters Ichimei Fukuda, the quiet and gentle son of the family's Japanese gardener. Unnoticed by those around them, a tender love affair begins to blossom. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the two are cruelly pulled apart.
-
-
My first negative review
- By Karen O'Byrne on 11-11-15
By: Isabel Allende
-
Birnam Wood
- A Novel
- By: Eleanor Catton
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 12 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A landslide has closed the Korowai Pass on New Zealand’s South Island, cutting off the town of Thorndike and leaving a sizable farm abandoned. The disaster presents an opportunity for Birnam Wood, an undeclared, unregulated, sometimes-criminal, sometimes-philanthropic guerrilla gardening collective that plants crops wherever no one will notice. For years, the group has struggled to break even. To occupy the farm at Thorndike would mean a shot at solvency at last. But the enigmatic American billionaire Robert Lemoine also has an interest in the place.
-
-
Outstanding thriller w/ exceptional character development
- By Bradley T. Collins on 04-21-23
By: Eleanor Catton
-
Lessons
- By: Ian McEwan
- Narrated by: Simon McBurney
- Length: 17 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, eleven-year-old Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. 2,000 miles from his mother's protective love, stranded at an unusual boarding school, his vulnerability attracts piano teacher Miss Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade.
-
-
Narrator Simon McBurney gets my 100% rating
- By Peggy M on 09-26-22
By: Ian McEwan
-
Violeta
- A Novel
- By: Isabel Allende, Frances Riddle
- Narrated by: Yareli Arizmendi
- Length: 11 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Violeta comes into the world on a stormy day in 1920, the first girl in a family with five boisterous sons. From the start, her life is marked by extraordinary events, for the ripples of the Great War are still being felt, even as the Spanish flu arrives on the shores of her South American homeland almost at the moment of her birth.
-
-
Not my favorite....
- By Pat Brett on 02-14-22
By: Isabel Allende, and others
-
Whale
- By: Cheon Myeong-kwan, Chi-Young Kim - translator
- Narrated by: Cindy Kay
- Length: 11 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Whale, set in a remote village in South Korea, follows the lives of many linked characters, including Geumbok, an extremely ambitious woman who has been chasing an indescribable thrill ever since she first saw a whale crest in the ocean; her mute daughter, Chunhui, who communicates with elephants; and a one-eyed woman who controls honeybees with a whistle. Brimming with surprises and wicked humor, Whale is an adventure-satire of epic proportions by one of the most original voices in international literature.
-
-
Whale
- By Amber Dehner on 07-20-23
By: Cheon Myeong-kwan, and others
-
The Romantic
- A Novel
- By: William Boyd
- Narrated by: Kobna Holdbrook-Smith
- Length: 17 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the award-winning, internationally best-selling author, a beguiling romp of a novel, at once intimate and panoramic, about the adventures and misadventures of a nineteenth-century everyman.
-
-
Read the Author's Note first, not in the audiobook
- By Paul Haahr on 12-02-23
By: William Boyd
-
The Beauty of Humanity Movement
- A Novel
- By: Camilla Gibb
- Narrated by: Jenny Ikeda
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Camilla Gibb reached international best seller status with novels that garner immense critical acclaim for their stunning insights into the human condition. In The Beauty of Humanity Movement, three people’s lives in modern Vietnam turn on the whims of fate—even as each strives for a finer reality. Freshly returned from the United States, Maggie is an art curator in search of her father. Old Man Hung, a soup seller, may hold the secret that could change Maggie's destiny. And Tu’ is a tour guide who will have a stunning effect on them both.
-
-
A book I won't forget
- By Amazon Customer on 10-20-11
By: Camilla Gibb
Critic reviews
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2021 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE
NOMINEE FOR THE 2021 GRAND PRIX DU LIVRE MONTREAL
SHEILA FISCHMAN SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2021 COLE FOUNDATION PRIZE FOR TRANSLATION
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 SCOTT MONCRIEF PRIZE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD
“Just like tender, strong and graceful Vietnamese silk threads, Kim Thúy masterfully weaves us through Vietnam’s twentieth-century history while binding us to the lives of its people so that their experiences expand our worldview. Em is an original, innovative, poetic and haunting novel that deserves to be read, shared, studied and discussed.” (Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, author of The Mountains Sing)
“Em may be [Kim Thúy’s] finest yet. More assured in her writing and less concerned about blurring the boundary between factual and fictional truth, Thúy is mesmerizing in this tale."—Maclean’s