Smorgasbord Book Promotions – My First Book – #Historical #Vietnam – The Village Teacher by neihtn (Nguyễn Trọng Hiền)

Posted on by

Welcome to the series which I hope will encourage more authors to come forward with their books to share here with you…First books can be very close to our hearts, but also can be overlooked as other books come along. Details on how to participate at the end of the post.

Today delighted to welcome a new author to the blog sharing his first book… I would like to introduce neihtn (Nguyễn Trọng Hiền) and The Village Teacher.

About the book

At the end of the 19th century, during the early years of French colonization, a village teacher participates in the palace examinations in the imperial city of Hue, Vietnam. There he meets a young Vietnamese-French woman. Despite their attraction for each other, a series of trials and adversities challenge them both. Set against a well-detailed background of political intrigue and social prejudice, their love faces opposition from family and society, as people they never suspect as enemies threaten to put an end not only to their relationship but also to his life.

One of the reviews for the book

Elizabeth Gauffreau
5.0 out of 5 stars Thought-Provoking & Engaging Historical Fiction

Village Teacher is a historical novel by Neihtn (Nguyen Trong Hien) set in Vietnam during French occupation at the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th. The novel opens with the protagonist, a teacher/scholar named Tam, leaving the building where he has just taken a national examination that will determine his future. His final essay? A discussion of reforms needed to bring the country’s educational system into the modern age. For me as a reader, opening hooks don’t get much better than this!

I felt immediately drawn to Tam. He is a brilliant scholar, yet genuinely humble and self-effacing. He stands ready to help those in need, including a young woman set upon by thugs as he walks back to the inn where he is staying. This incident sets in motion the love story which will become the heart of the book, as Tam and the young woman, Giang, face obstacle after obstacle to being together, most triggered by their living in a country under foreign occupation. I found this love story particularly well-done, with a subtlety and nuance I greatly appreciated.

The plot is quite complex, with machinations from a variety antagonists. For me, this complexity is a clear representation of the difficulty of surviving in a traditionally hierarchical society under a system of governance imposed by foreign occupiers while trying to hold onto your own culture and as much of your system of governance as your foreign occupiers will allow–not to mention dealing with heavily-armed rebel factions. Village Teacher brought home the full extent of these complexities in a way I hadn’t previously encountered.

An important question Village Teacher raises in my mind is the balance between history and fiction in a historical novel. Is the author’s primary goal to fictionalize a historical event (or time period) to bring history alive for readers–with the fiction serving the history–or is it the other way around? Is the author’s goal to provide the historical context needed for readers to fully understand the characters’ motivations and experience in the world, with the history serving the fiction? While Village Teacher has a relatively high percentage of history to fiction, I found it entirely necessary to the story (in addition to being intrinsically interesting). The author made a good decision to use an omniscient narrator to relay the exposition and not put it in the mouths of the characters, which can sometimes happen in historical novels.

For a novel coming in at over 400 pages, Village Teacher was a surprising quick read; I finished it much sooner than I expected. I was also surprised by how I felt at the end. While the ending was satisfying, with no loose ends, I was reluctant to leave these characters behind. I had come to care about them that much. 

Read the reviews and buy the book: Amazon US – And: Amazon UK

Also by Nguyễn Trọng Hiền

Read the reviews and buy the books: Amazon US – And: Amazon UK – Follow the author: Goodreads – Blog: Books and Photographs

About the author

Nguyễn Trọng Hiền (or Hien T. Nguyen as he is known in the United States) was born in North Việt Nam, emigrated with his family to South Việt Nam in 1954, and came to the United States in 1975 at the end of the Việt Nam war. He lived in California and West Virginia, before settling in New Jersey.

He worked for Wells Fargo Bank in California, Allied Chemical in West Virginia and New Jersey, and for Johnson & Johnson in New Jersey. He retired from J&J at the beginning of 2018 and is now spending most of his time doing his favorite activities: reading, writing, bird and landscape photography, playing with his grandchildren and Jackie, a Golden Retriever.

In 2012, using the pen name of neihtn, he published on Amazon “Village Teacher”, a love story about the final mandarin examinations in Việt Nam at the dawn of the 20th century.

In August 2020, he published “The Siege of An Lộc”, a novel based on the battle of An Lộc in 1972.

He is currently helping a friend translate his book from Vietnamese into English

 

Thanks very much for dropping in today and I hope you will be leaving with some books.

43 thoughts on “Smorgasbord Book Promotions – My First Book – #Historical #Vietnam – The Village Teacher by neihtn (Nguyễn Trọng Hiền)”

  1. Pingback: Smorgasbord Blog Magazine Weekly Update – April 14th – 20th 2025 – It’s a Cat’s Life, Music, Movie Themes, Honduras Cuisine, Short Stories, Book Reviews, Green Tea, Bloggers and Funnies | Smorgasbord Blog Magazine

  3. Pingback: Smorgasbord Blog Magazine Weekly Update – April 14th – 20th 2025 – It’s a Cat’s Life, Music, Movie Themes, Honduras Cuisine, Short Stories, Book Reviews, Green Tea, Bloggers and Funnies | Smorgasbord Blog Magazine

  4. That’s very interesting, as i always wanted to know more about Vietnam and the circumstances there. Even though the author has left his homeland long time ago there are moments and situations one never can’t forget. Thanks for the great review to Liz. Oh yeah, another book i need to have on my TBR. hugsx Michael

    Liked by 1 person

  5. I had never hear about this author or his book. What a challenge to write about the past in a homeland he had left long ago. Poignantly a love story that no doubt repeats itself in many lands.

    Vietnam was the first time I realised wars did not end with The War. Happily unaware when I was eleven and we arrived in Australia, we soon began to hear about the Vietnam War – ‘All the way with LBJ’ and Australia’s part. I did not understand, but thought I would when I was grownup! How many of us knew much about Vietnamese history? There was a collective sigh of relief when a change of government in the early seventies brought the end of conscription, just before the boys in my year at college were due to register for the ‘ballot’. Of course that was not the end of the story of Vietnam.

    Liked by 1 person

  7. I always trust a review written by Liz, and this one’s terrific. I wouldn’t have come across this book were it not for this series. Off to Amazon now! ♥♥

    Liked by 2 people

  9. This sounds like a wonderful read. I really enjoy historical fiction, and if set in a culture that I’m unfamiliar with, all the better. Plus when Liz gives her endorsement, it’s sure to be fabulous. Thanks for sharing, Sally, and congrats to Hien T. Nguyen on an excellent book.

    Liked by 2 people

  14. How wonderful to see Hien and Village Teacher featured today! I’m sure you can tell from my review how much I enjoyed it. I read his second book, too. I’m hoping to see a third at some point.

    Liked by 4 people

Comments are closed.