The Emperor of Gladness: OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB: A Novel + LGBTQ CLASSIC

By Ocean Vuong

A New York Times bestseller - An Oprah's Book Club pick - Selected as one of the Best Books of 2025 by TIME and NPR - Finalist for the 2026 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence

"Extraordinary . . . A moving and resonant portrait of people living at the edges of society, and the strength it takes to endure and grow." -Oprah Winfrey

Ocean Vuong returns with a sweeping and compassionate novel about chosen family, unexpected connections, and the stories we create to keep ourselves alive.

Living only once can feel like the hardest task of all...

On a storm-soaked evening at the end of summer in the fading industrial town of East Gladness, Connecticut, nineteen-year-old Hai stands on a bridge, moments from ending his life. A voice from across the river stops him. It belongs to Grazina, an elderly widow slipping into dementia, who urges him toward another path. With nowhere else to go, Hai becomes her caretaker. Over the course of a year, the two form an unlikely and life-changing bond built on empathy, spiritual searching, and heartache, one that reshapes Hai's understanding of himself, his family, and a community on the verge of collapse.

Following the currents of memory, history, and time, The Emperor of Gladness reveals how love, work, and loneliness form the foundation of American life. At its center is a courageous story about what it means to live on the margins and to confront the wounds carried by a shared soul. Vuong's signature style-innovative structure, lyrical clarity, and the blending of hardship with tenderness-comes through in this story of loss, hope, and the desperate reach for one of life's rarest mercies: a second chance.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0G5321G6Z
• ISBN13: 9798295446412
• Release Date: May 2025
• Publisher: Oprah
• Length: 416 Pages
• Weight: 1.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 1.1" x 6.0"