WHAT DOESN’T KILL US
A Reading by BRANDY LIEN WORRALL
Monday, October 5 / 7PM
Stern Lounge – CLAS Austin Room 217
Open to the Public / Pizza will be Served
Brandy Liên Worrall will read and field questions from her groundbreaking memoir WHAT DOESN’T KILL US on Monday, October 5 at 7PM in the Stern Lounge / Austin Building Room 217. Sponsored by the Asian and Asian American Studies Institute in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, this event is open to the public.
Ms. Worrall is also the author of eight collections of poetry, as well as having served as editor of numerous magazines, journals, and anthologies. She is the owner and editor of Rabbit Fool Press, a small family-owned-and-operated publishing company based in Vancouver. Brandy received her MA in Asian American Studies from UCLA in 2002 and her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia in 2012. She is represented by the Anne McDermid & Associates Literary Agency.
WHAT DOESN’T KILL US chronicles Brandy’s journey with an aggressive, rare breast cancer at the age of 31. The book reflects on the parallels between her experiences with cancer, and her American father’s and Vietnamese mother’s trauma and survival during and after the Vietnam War. The book crosses borders, from rural, Amish-country Pennsylvania, where Brandy had grown up, to Vancouver, where she lived with her parents, husband, and two young children while enduring aggressive chemotherapy, radiation, and a double mastectomy. The book also explores the enduring legacy of chemical warfare on three generations. That both of her parents had been heavily exposed to Agent Orange does not escape Brandy, who searches for reasons why she would have cancer despite not having a family history, as well as having had epilepsy as a child. She also wonders how this exposure has touched her own children. Brandy tells her story with razor-sharp humor and wit, leaving readers a lasting impression of the meaning of survival.
Co-sponsored by the Asian American Cultural Center and Creative Writing Program / Additional support from the NEH Enduring Questions Grant
For more information, contact: Ms. Fe Delos-Santos at fe.delos-santos@uconn.edu or 860.486.5083