Vichet Chum‘s “Kween” is a vividly portrayed Cambodian American queer coming of age story

One of the things we love about the YA genre in the last decade (or so), is how it’s expanded to include stories from communities we previously hadn’t heard much about.

Last week, we explored the lives of teens coming of age during the 2019 Hong Kong riots. We’ve also read books about a critical and tragic moment in Malaysian history and more. 

This week’s novel is “Kween” by Vichet Chum. The story delves into the Cambodian American experience, taking us to Lowell, MA where a queer Khmer teen is coping with the the absence of her parents while also going through the typical high school identity crises.

Soma Kear’s parents survived the Cambodian genocide and escaped to the US as refugees. Everything was going well (mostly) until her father (Ba) was unexpectedly deported back to Cambodia for a decades-old misdemeanor, ripping the family apart. After her father’s deportation, her mother (Ma) also temporarily heads back to Cambodia to help Ba adjust to his new life. That also means that Soma’s much-older sister Dahvy is the unofficial head-of-the-household, even as she juggles her own teaching job at Soma’s school while also planning her wedding to a fellow teacher.

Needless to say, it’s stressful all around!

Soma channels her feelings through slam poetry, but when a video she creates on a whim suddenly goes viral, she’s unprepared for the attention. Suddenly everyone she knows, including the cute girl she has a crush on, and her hard-ass history teacher, takes notice.

And everyone, from her best friend to said history teacher, to her sister’s fiancé is pushing her to submit to her school’s spoken word contest so that she can show her talents to the world. But Soma isn’t sure whether she’s brave enough to put everything out there in front of the whole town. Until the video, her rhymes were mostly for her. Will things change if she decides to share her poems with everyone else?

“Kween” was released just this week by Quill Tree Books! (Their wonderful publicity team also sent us e-copies). You can order your own copy here. 

Asha: I loved this book!

Lakshmi: Agreed. This book was so great! (I know I've been opening our chats a lot with that sentiment, but we've been on a roll!) And throughout the whole story, “Kween” was so layered and interesting!! I want every library to get it.

Asha: It also felt like a refugee story we haven’t seen before. Where one minor infraction has consequences without warning so many years later.

I was so mad at the system for putting Soma’s Ba in that position! Yes, we heard about it more under the last administration, but it’s been happening under everyone.

As we see as this book plays out, there was also often this bait and switch that refugees with criminal records often faced.: you’re good if this is the only thing and you keep checking in…oh just kidding, now you’re deported.

Lakshmi: Yes. Unfortunately, in recent years families like Soma's have been facing deportation more and more. When I was at NBC, my editor executive produced a series called Deported on real-life stories like this one.

That series focused on refugees (some of whom came to the U.S. from Southeast Asia as babies) who were deported back to Southeast Asia and having to rebuild their lives.

and having their parents, children and communities manage without their loved ones (who were often also the breadwinners of the family).

And you are totally right that unfair policies towards refugees in the US has been a bipartisan affair.

This is from that NBC series I mentioned: 

In 1975, more than 1.2 million refugees from Southeast Asia fled war and were resettled in the United States — the largest resettlement of a refugee group in U.S. history.

But their stories of movement didn't end there: in 1996, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) expanded the definition of what types of crimes could result in detention and deportation. The IIRIRA also allowed for that broader definition to be applied retroactively, resulting in more than 16,000 Southeast Asian Americans receiving orders of removal — 78 percent of which were based on old criminal records.

In 2002, the United States and Cambodia signed a repatriation agreement that opened the pathway for refugees to be deported back to Cambodia; since then, more than 600 people have been deported. 

Lakshmi: Sigh, who was President in 1996?

Asha: Damnit, Bill Clinton!!

Lakshmi: Because of this long history of unjust deportation,  there are a lot of community groups in cities with large Southeast Asian populations (Deported was largely filmed in Philly) that are devoted to this.

Speaking of — I loved learning about the history of Lowell, Massachusetts and its refugee community!

I knew about Philly's community and Minnesota

(and different cities in California, of course) but was unaware of Lowell and it's history as a resettlement place.

Asha: Yes! Lowell is an interesting choice for a resettlement community.

Not to get off topic, but you have to wonder whether some of it is political…these countries want/need their population back. And this is one way to accomplish that.

Lakshmi: I think it's more using these refugees as pawns in the larger geopolitical chess game that has always dominated that region— but I haven't read up! Whatever the reasons behind it, it's incredibly inhumane.

Asha: 100 percent.

But back to the book. Soma is fifteen years younger than her sister.So their experiences growing up with their parents are different, which causes some conflict

I think I’ve read somewhere that every sibling experiences a different version of their parents, and that’s especially true with such a large age gap

Soma, being 16, chafes at Dahvy’s way of doing things, while Dahvy is just trying to keep it all together

Lakshmi: Also, Dahvy came around when they were very new to the United States

the war and the resettlement were not that long ago when she was young so her parents emotionally were probably very different!

I actually wanted to go back to the history of Lowell too. Because this book does a GREAT job of weaving history, music, and intersectionality into the text? There are A LOT of threads at all times

but the author really doesn't tangle any (I am stretching the metaphor).

But tying the history of Lowell (a former mill town) and the mill to Soma's story was just so interesting and illuminating. Here’s a nice example:

…You couldn’t live in Lowell without knowing

the basic history of the mill girls. As the story goes, as indus- trialization was booming, factories opened up here in the 1800s, and poor New England families sent their daughters away to work and live on their own. People always painted a sad, sorry portrait of their lives, but honestly, right now, I think I could hang with the idea of taking a step away from my family—Dahvy, that is. I mean, we were already on that track anyways.

“Some of them were younger than you, you know? They didn’t have their parents. All they did was work.”

I just thought it was really nice and illuminating that the author made these connections.

Asha: It really was! Soma’s history teacher also emphasizes how history is not just theoretical but peoples’ lived experiences.

Lakshmi: I think that's when I realized that I loved history—, when it is explained that it is more than just memorizing facts. It’s studying how people lived and how decisions (like that awful law Bill Clinton signed!) have consequences that resonate for generations.

Asha: And while Soma thinks of him just as an old, white, man, he does actually understand that remembering who gets to tell their stories is important.

Lakshmi: yes.

I also wanted to talk about the intentional moments of intersectionality in the book and the exploration of what it means to idealize the mills.

Sophat dropped his dancing and began to flail wildly, overemphasizing words like they. All. Mattered. Under the influence of skunk, this was his usual pro- gression: dance, dance, rail. I knew he was peaking. My job now was to sit back for the diatribe.

“I mean, look at those mills. Ooh, we love our mills. We love our industrial city. We make it so quaint. But those things rep- resent a lot of horrible stuff. That cotton came from plantations picked by slaves. That cotton was turned into fabric by poor little girlies like you and me. Not to mention, rewind, those factories sit on Pawtucket, Massa-adchu-es-et, and Pennacook land. And um, no one wants to talk about any of that. We just want to keep telling the same abridged history…

But all of that knowledge comes from Soma's friend Sophat who she notes goes on these philosophical rants often and that they can be overwhelming (as well as educational).

Asha: Definitely! I also liked the way music is woven through this story.Soma write slam poetry, but they could easily be lyrics. And as we all know, music and lyrics are perfect places to channel big emotions.

Asha: To bring it back to history, musicians were among those targeted during the genocide. And a lot of Cambodian music was lost. There was a thriving rock scene that just disappeared.

Music can be used to channel resistance, which is scary for a totalitarian regime

Lakshmi: Yes! So  much culture was lost.

Asha: Soma uses her slam poetry to channel her anger and frustration And to try to make sense of what’s going on her in world

Lakshmi: The Asian American poetry scene (which the fictional Soma and the real-life author are a part of) has always been very vibrant!

Asha: We have to go soon, do you have a final thought?

Lakshmi: I just want to continue to rave about this book. I hope it gets all the attention

Also, were you struck by the fact that he's NOT from New England? The author grew up in Texas!

Asha: I didn’t even notice to be honest!

Lakshmi: He really embodied a place he's not familiar with. That feels like a hard feat to pull off.

I also thought he wrote the teen girl main character so well!

Asha: Me too!