Ticket to Childhood

Ticket to Childhood, a slender novel by Vietnam's Nguyen Nhat Anh, begins with the inauspicious, but ultimately ironic, line: "One day, I suddenly realized that life was dull and boring."

Little Mui, the narrator looking back from the vantage point of adulthood, proceeds to recount a childhood of mischievous effort to overcome that tedium. And such efforts, he discovers, are what makes life exciting and gives it meaning. And what works in life works for the novel as well.