Rating: 
Summary: This book was terrible!
Review: After reading 3 short stories from this book, I had to put it down. Not only were the stories uninteresting, but they had no noticeable point. These stories were also politically correct. I have not read one piece of politically correct literature that I liked. Maybe the author did successfully capture the psyche of a Vietnamese person, but it was still boring. DO NOT READ THIS BOOK IF YOU WANT TO ENJOY AN INTERESTING ACCOUNT OF THE VIETNAM WAR!
Rating: 
Summary: A masterpiece
Review: Anyone who appreciates brilliant writing and great literature -- especially those who enjoy short stories -- will bow their heads in awe at this collection. It doesn't get any better than this...
Rating:
Summary: A rich portrait of the Vietnamese soul.
Review: At turns tragic and tender, comic and cosmic, this stirring collection of short stories passes the core test of great fiction: its power is both particular and universal. On the level of the particular, the author succeeds in opening a window on the soul of the Vietnamese, a people whose lives and communities are torn apart by a war not of their own making, a people struggling to assimilate--without disappearing--in this strange new world called America. Yet Butler's vision is also universal: the pain of loss, betrayal, and dislocation, the hope of love, survival, and forgiveness--these are experiences which resonate across the spectrum of humankind, all the more so because Butler effectively balances narrative voices both young and old, male and female.
There is a wonderful contrapuntal force to these stories. As you move through Butler's seamless blend of anecdote, reminiscence, and fairy tale, themes and motifs continually recur, subtly reinforcing one another: the grip of tradition, the power of ghosts, the shallowness of American materialism, the call to ancestor worship, the scars of war, the deep-rootedness of ethnic division. Highly recommended for anyone who cares about: (1) the Vietnam War; (2) the immigrant experience; or (3) great fiction. Read the whole collection, but if you must be selective, my favorites were "Open Arms," a poignant tale of culture clash and true belief, "Love," a laugh-out-loud revenge story, and "The American Couple," a deeply psychological account of catharsis and recovered love.
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Summary: A beautiful book, beautifully crafted.
Review: Butler, whose ear for dialogue is ordinarily one of his strongest assests, also relies here on a previosuly unsuspected depth of descriptive passion. The lush jungles and villages of Vietnam are as easily evoked as the muggy bayous of southeast Louisiana. Butler's narrators all seem authentic; the voices are so strong that the question of whether the author is Vietnamese or American is quickly made irrelevant. The author writes like a dream, and the pace and strength of these stories rise smokelike throughout the novel, culminating in a final paragraph that rivals "The Great Gatsby" for Greatest American Final Lines.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful collection of bittersweet stories
Review: Despite its Pulitzer, this moving little collection of stories has sadly slipped beneath the average readers' radar. Although written by an American who served as a translator during the war in Vietnam, the stories still capture that quintessential Asian flavor. If I had not know otherwise, I would have thought the author was natively Vietnamese. The stories are set in Louisiana, and focus on the fictional lives of Vietnamese-Americans who have left their home behind. Though a few stories were less than stellar, the vast majority conveyed a deep sadness and profound optimism that I found truly enchanting. Don't miss this one!
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful collection of bittersweet stories
Review: Despite its Pulitzer, this moving little collection of stories has sadly slipped beneath the average readers' radar. Although written by an American who served as a translator during the war in Vietnam, the stories still capture that quintessential Asian flavor. If I had not know otherwise, I would have thought the author was natively Vietnamese. The stories are set in Louisiana, and focus on the fictional lives of Vietnamese-Americans who have left their home behind. Though a few stories were less than stellar, the vast majority conveyed a deep sadness and profound optimism that I found truly enchanting. Don't miss this one!
Rating:
Summary: I loved this book! Funny, poignant - it touched me deeply.
Review: Even if I had not grown up in Lake Charles, LA and attended the university there, where Mr. Butler teaches, I would have loved this book. Funny thing is, I discovered it quite by accident in a public library in San Francisco! The book is about Vietnamese people in and around Lake Charles. The fact that we have this place in common, not only "brought the stories home" for me, but makes me very proud and happy that a writer of such high caliber so masterfully captured the region's unique essence and that of the Asian immigrant's experience there. My own experience in Lake Charles was very much that of the Asian in this race-conscious Southern state. Each story, however, was not so much about discrimination or racial differences as about personal growth and assimilation. Butler's characters demonstrate that there is no ONE Asian personality just like there is no ONE personality for any other race. The people are believable, the place is certainly real, and the author has done a wonderful job of writing. Thank you, Mr. Butler.
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Summary: #1 on my Christmas list
Review: I am a student in the 11th grade at a high school in Georgia. Recently, as part of a study on the Vietnam war and the impact it had on the country and the soldiers who fought, I read one of the short stories from A Good Scent from a Strange Mountian. It was wonderful.I would suggest it to anyone who wants to take our country's history and make it personal to them. Although I never experienced the Vietnam War, I felt it's effects right along with Butler. I'm asking for this magnificent book for Christmas!!!
Rating:
Summary: A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
Review: I am a Vietnamese and I have been shocked when reading this book. The author described the Vietnamese characters so gloomily. They are very strange. I have never met someone similar to one of them in my whole life, and I am 54 years old. I see that the author has too much imagination about Vietnamese people. He put the traits of the characters in William Faulkner's books into the Vietnamese characters in his book. (By the way, I don't like Faulkner's writings). It looks like they are backward kinds of people, who are incoherent in their thinking, crazy in their behaviors, superstitious in their beliefs, and sad in their moods. I wish these kinds of books would not appear in the world's literature. Those books make the stereotype about Vietnamese people in the mind of Americans becomes stronger. It's not surprising that the book got the Pulitzer prize: because the judges for the prize were not Vietnamese. If they were, the book would not have gotten the prize.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible
Review: I am Vietnamese and I grew up in New Orleans during the 80's and 90's when the first waves were settling down there. I hate to tell this to everyone on this site but this book is the worst piece of fiction ever written. Like many books written by someone who does not belong to the culture that he writes about, the book takes great liberties with the imagination and presents the stories from the viewpoint of the writer and not the actual people. The Vietnamese characters in the book are portrayed as backwards, uneducated, and simple. Further, the stories are depressing and very few of the characters seem to have any success. If you actually grew up in New Orleans during the time that the Vietnamese Americans were setting root during the 80's and 90's, you would know that by and large, the community pulled itself from nothing to become quite successful. No real Vietnamese American thinks or acts like the characters portrayed in this book. I repeat - no Vietnamese American thinks or acts like the characters portrayed in this book. The book repeats many of the fallacies that I have noticed in other books written by predominantly caucasian male authors about East Asian Culture. There always seems to be 1) an asian prostitute 2) caucasian guy with asian bride 3) asian male in an emasculated role 4) asian people as backwards and simple. Quite sad. This book reminds me quite a bit of Memoirs of a Geisha, though that portrayed Japanese culture in a better light. By the way, the lady on which "Memoirs of a Geisha" is based and written about was quite upset at the author of Memoirs of a Geisha and did not feel that it portrayed her life or her thoughts in any way at all. Regardless, if you really want to find out about the Vietnamese American experience you should really read a book written by a Vietnamese American.
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