Bunkong Tuon has a new book out! The Doctor Will Fix It is about raising a bi-racial daughter in the Age of Trump.
BK is a Cambodian-American writer and critic. He is the author of Gruel, And So I Was Blessed (both published by NYQ Books), The Doctor Will Fix It (Shabda Press), and Dead Tongue (a chapbook with Joanna C. Valente, Yes Poetry). He teaches at Union College, in Schenectady, NY.
Here are some words about the book by Alexis Rhone Fancher and Alan Catlin.
“Bunkong Tuon is saying something new and important in The Doctor Will Fix It. Exploring uncharted territory: How to raise his dazzling, bi-racial daughter to her fullest potential in today’s America. The infatuated father, himself an outsider, searches for answers in these astonishing and tender poems which ponder gender and racial identity and create a roadmap of what it means to love. This book is honest, frustrated, tender, and human.”
– Alexis Rhone Fancher, author of Junkie Wife, poetry editor, Cultural Weekly
“The Doctor Will Fix It continues the poet’s primary theme: the importance of family. Tuon’s previous collection, the heart-rending Gruel deals with the refugee experience, of literally being carried out of Cambodia on his grandmother’s back and of his new life in America. And So I Was Blessed follows his new life as a husband, father, and teacher with a revealing journey to Vietnam where he learns about his late father’s roots. Now with The Doctor Will Fix It, Tuon explores the vagaries of parenting, the misgivings and joys, the problems of bi-racialism and small-minded prejudice and how we deal with these realities. Ultimately, the poet’s sense is that with love and hope, a better world that has such children as his will prevail. Even impossible dreams may come true.”
– Alan Catlin, poet, editor Misfit Magazine
