She is a Haunting — Matthew’s Book Club
By Rashauna Herm
Recommended reading age: 16 & up
“Anger is a fire. Anger is adrenaline. It’s kept me going for so long, burning for so long, with ambition, with pettiness. I’ll show you had become a mantra throughout high school.”
Jade Nguyen has a personal mission to complete over the next five weeks. Her long estranged father has promised to pay for her college tuition if she, and her younger sister Lily, spend a month with him in Đà Lat, Vietnam. Her father is restoring an old French house, locally known as Nhà Hoa, and Jade is tasked with creating a website (with a cute girl to help her) for the property. The history of the house is fraught with violence and colonial racism, but her father has a goal in mind of transforming it into the house of his families’ dreams, but could never attain, as they were servants at Nhà Hoa.
Jade has always lied to fit in — lied about her sexuality, about her feelings, about her absent father, and about her mother having to work overtime to pick up the slack — so, over the month if she pretends to be the happy daughter, straight and Vietnamese enough to satisfy her father and his investors, she will make out like a bandit.
Soon after arriving, it becomes apparent to Jade that the house has a malevolent energy: it is plagued by dead insects, unexplainable strange noises, and apparitions, one of whom is a beautiful Vietnamese bride, who only offers this cryptic warning: “do not eat.” Jade is certain the house is haunted, but neither her sister or father believe anything is happening. With the help of her cute website partner, she tries to stage her own haunting to prove that the house is indeed hungry for attention… and that it wants to destroy them all.
She Is A Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran (who uses they/them pronouns) is a spellbinding, intensely vivid and unique novel. I admired the whiplash of emotions the story gave me, the quick cuts from beauty to horror. Tran has a searing, twisted prose that really sinks it hooks into you. This book is the definition of slow burn, but I am glad that I stuck with it and once the mystery started to unravel and pieces of the puzzle began to fit into place, I felt proud for working through the convoluted history of Nhà Hoa with Jade.
I love how Tran works the history of French colonization of Vietnam into the story, but they reframe it in a way in which a family with a traumatic past can take back their power. I think that this is such a caring way to show love for the people who came before us, while reforming the future and starting the process of healing. I think it’s an interesting idea for BIPOC (Black Indigenous People of Color) to take the sites of our trauma and turn them into places where we can celebrate the strength and the courage of our ancestors, instead of just mourning their fate.
I appreciate a story about a possessed lonely house and I love a book that focuses on horror from an unseen source. I think horror is such a wonderful, versatile genre to traverse the lasting effects of racism and how it can be passed on as generational trauma, as well as misplaced anger and rage.
Amidst the haunted house activity, Jade has a lot on her plate. Jade is bisexual, but she is afraid of her parent’s disapproval, and she keeps up a totally different personality in front of her family. She knows that college will be her key to living a new life, out of the closet and as her true self. I really related to Jade for the most part. It is so exhausting to have to create different versions of yourself because you don’t know which one will be accepted or safe in any given setting. It sucks to have to put certain aspects of yourself locked away. I think it’s important to realize that there will come a time when the right people will come into your life and not care if you are bisexual, trans, or queer. Obviously, there are a lot of hateful people in this world, but there are even more people in this world who will celebrate you for who you are! I encourage you to seek out your local Queer spaces and find your own niche — or create your own niche!
She Is A Haunting from Trang Thanh Tran is a sensational tale of identity, colonialism and the effects of intergenerational trauma that will leave your mind reeling. Tran is a welcome new voice to the world of horror, and I will be eagerly waiting for whatever they publish next!
About the Author
Rashauna Herm is a 30 something Denver local. She enjoys a good potato-based dish, scary movies and glitter.
