Will I love 36 Streets?

TR Napper paints a vivid picture of a cyberpunk future Vietnam in 36 Streets.

In TR Napper’s 36 Streets, part of Vietnam is again under occupation, this time by the Chinese military, but a protracted battle still rages in the south of the country, proving once again that the Vietnamese are difficult if not impossible to conquer. The 36 Streets in question is a ‘neutral area’ in downtown Han Noi ruled over by several street gangs. The Chinese government leave their operations relatively unmolested because it serves their purpose to do so.

Lin Thi Vu is a… show more.

36 Streets by Australian author T.R. Napper is a cyberpunk thriller set in a futuristic noir Vietnam that tackles identity in a unique way.

The protagonist, a woman born in Vietnam but raised in Australia, grapples with her sense of belonging—deported from her adopted country due to racist government policies, her body language and command of English is as an Australian, and she is painfully aware that her Vietnamese is heavily accented and uncertain, and that her body language doesn’t match the locals of her birth nation.

Add to that the ability to edit human memory and to experience VR… show more.

36 Streets focuses on a protagonist torn between two worlds. Here we are treated to the point of view of Lin, born in Vietnam but raised in Australia.

Returning to her homeland, she is taken under the wing of Hanoi's crime boss, Bao Nguyen, and schooled in the art of incredible, high-tech violence. Napper’s whip-smart prose leaps off the page, but it is the emotional roundhouses that really deliver.