Book Review: <Stay true> by Hua Hsu

<Stay true> by Hua Hsu, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, is a memoir about his unlikely friendship with Ken. They both try to stay true, or seek their own authenticities via very different manners and matters. But the seeking was brutally interrupted by random violence. This randomness makes it even more cruel, and Hsu, just like Zadie Smith, thinks it can only be interpreted, or buffered by writing.

The backdrop of the story speaks extra loud to us. We who live in San Francisco bay, we the Asian diaspora, especially those second gen immigrants. The localities of the story, being the Cupertino Asian strip malls, the long and painful drive along I-80. And the unique Berkely subculture in the 80s and 90s, mixtape, Zines, and their reflection of the larger socialist and counterculture student movement.

Hsu and Ken cannot be more different, Ken, is the typical Asian immigrant who wants to assimilate. Judging by the way he talks (frat boy), songs he listens to (Dave Mathews) and the clothes he wears (Acrombie Fitch), one can barely tell he is not white. While Hsu loves everything niche: zine, vintage of vintage clothes, and the indie indie music that no one else listens to. But beneath the differences, there is the same longing and striving to belong. Growing out this same-ness, is the undeniable kindness for each other. Though this love wear different colors, red for Ken and blue for Hsu.

This topic of trying to negotiate the space between fitting in vs staying true is not new. But Hsu did some great job, with beautiful concreteness in storytelling, electrically charged emotions permeating throughout. There is jealousy, romance, anger, contempt, but also tenderness and vulnerability. For queer minorities and immigrants, you can find resonance but also an extra layer of trying to find the space between gay (mainstream) vs queer (specific subcultural).

What I love the most about the book is Hsu’s raw and aching reflection on the deep grief after the loss. It is also what I love so much about the book <Norwegian Wood> by Haruku Murakami and the movie <Drive by my car> directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi (also based on a short story by Murakami).

Post Ken’s passing, mournings of different friends take on different forms and lives of their own. Some spent all their energy investigating the “why”. Some resolved into violence. Some shut down and become completely silent. Some avoid, and escape into work, numbing, or theater and dreams.

For Hsu, he accurately depicts his own grief. In that his own sense of time and reality, becomes completely distorted and even disillusioned. The past, and the sudden loss is so brutally clear, there is no space for alternative potentialities. While the future is full of anxious uncertainties and ambiguity.

Shortly after Ken’s passing, Hsu starts to panic about every meetup with his loved ones will be the last time he sees them.

I think staying true to oneself is absolutely a lifelong challenge, but staying true to life, in particular, the inevitable tragic loss it brings is even harder. Fortunately, we are in the same village and can hold this sharp pain tenderly together, until the sufferings become the grounding earth we now all lie on.