Last Song of the Nation
A forgotten kingdom. A sacred vow. A journey home across centuries.
Centuries ago, the fate of a young Vietnamese noblewoman became entwined with the rise and fall of the Champa kingdom. Her name was Thanh Mai—a girl of silken grace and iron spirit, whose heart beat with forbidden love and a fierce loyalty to truth. Her story was nearly lost… until one man dared to follow its echo.
In modern-day California, Kien Quoc—a quiet Vietnamese-American engineer—receives his father’s dying wish: return to Vietnam and uncover the roots of their family’s past. His journey leads him into the heart of central Vietnam, where sacred towers sleep beneath moss and myth, and where the memory of Champa lingers in song, stone, and silence.
Guided by dreams and joined by Sari, a Balinese journalist equally devoted to Southeast Asia’s lost civilizations, Kien stumbles upon a revelation that challenges history, identity, and the very idea of nationhood. Along the way, they unearth a secret chamber beneath the holy valley of My Son—and within it, a truth that changes everything.
Told in sweeping, poetic prose, Last Song of the Nation weaves together two timelines: the fall of Champa through the eyes of a young woman trapped between war and destiny, and a contemporary quest for heritage, love, and healing. At its core lies a question that haunts generations: What do we owe the past, and what can it still teach us today?
This is a novel of memory and migration, of culture and compassion, of spirits that never die and songs that still carry across the wind.
