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Fire Road: The Napalm Girls Journey through the Horrors of War to Faith, Forgiveness, and Peace
Copyright 2017 by Kim Phuc Phan Thi. All rights reserved.
Cover and interior photograph of South Vietnamese children and soldiers on road copyright Nick Ut/Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Cover and interior photograph of burned edge copyright walrusmail/Getty Images. All rights reserved.
Interior photographs are the property of their respective copyright holders, and all rights are reserved. Here they are noted in the order they appear in the photo insert, all used with permission: Photograph of Kim Phuc (foreground) with napalm burns taken by Danh Hoang Van Bettman/Contributor/Getty Images; photograph of the napalm bombs exploding in Trang Bang copyright Nick Ut/AP Images; Kim with Vietnamese prime minister from authors personal collection; Kim, age 22, showing scars on back and arm copyright Nick Ut; Kim and baby Thomas copyright 1995 Anne Bayin; Kim and Toan in Scarborough in December 1992 from authors personal collection; Mom Nancy, Thomas, and Kim copyright 1995 Anne Bayin; Toan and Kim becoming Canadian citizens copyright 1998 Anne Bayin; photographs from the return trip to Vietnam copyright 2005 Anne Bayin; photographs taken in Cuba as well as Thomas and Stephen at Thomass wedding copyright 2013 and 2015 respectively by Steven Stafford, Vietnam Combat Veteran, U.S.M.C.; Kim with parents, grandson Kalel, and Doctor Jill Waibel from authors personal collection; photograph of Nick Ut and Kim copyright 2015 Steven Stafford; Toan hugging Kim copyright Nick Ut.
Designed by Dean H. Renninger
Edited by Bonne Steffen
The author is represented by the literary agency of Alive Literary Agency, 7680 Goddard St., Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920, www.aliveliterary.com.
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version.
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ISBN 978-1-4964-2429-7 (hc)
ISBN 978-1-4964-2430-3 (sc)
Build: 2017-09-15 08:57:19
For my three families:
My parents and siblings, whose compassion made a little girls suffering bearable
My husband and sons, my daughter-in-law and my grandson, whose unconditional love heals me a little more every day
My Faithway Baptist Church family, whose prayers help me stay the course.
List of Illustrations
INTRODUCTION
WAR, AND PEACE
A NOTE TO READERS
I have been dreaming about this book for nearly a decade, perhaps even longer than that, if I include the literary longings I felt but reflexively pushed aside when my sons were still young children who demanded constant care. When they are older, I shall pursue that dream, I reasoned, an appropriate response to that season of life. My sons are older now.
Ms. Denise Chong wrote a book about my story titled The Girl in the Picture, a marvelous and detailed account of Vietnams civil war that affected me, most notably the famous picture that was taken of me as I fled a certain napalm attack. What a thorough job Ms. Chong did as it relates to history and to geography, to dropping of bombs and to victims of war. But there was a story beneath the story told there, a divine underpinning that for many decades even I could not detect, a set of spiritual stepping-stones that, unbeknownst to me, were paving a path to get me to God.
That is the story I wish to tell in these pages. I wish to tell of Gods faithfulness, when I was enveloped by mind-numbing fear. I wish to tell of his kind provision for me, when I was shelterless and hungry and cold. I wish to tell of his pursuit of me, when I was sure I would live the sum of my days marginalized and unloved. But mostly, I wish to tell of his peace, the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, the peace that shall keep our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. For what I desired more than healing for my wounds and hope for my heart was peace for my troubled soul. Peace! Yes, I must write about that peace.
I should say here that because I longed so deeply for peace and thenmiracle of miraclesactually encountered peace, my approach to all of life centers on being at peace. I want to receive Gods gift of peace each day; I want to allow that peace to infiltrate my thoughts, my reactions, my work; I want to carry that peace with me wherever I go; and I want to share that peace with whomever I should meet.
What this means for you, my dear reader, is that if you came to this book in hopes of picking up weighty opinions on war, I fear I will disappoint you. I suppose there was a time when I did possess such opinionsand when we come to those bygone eras, I shall return briefly to that frame of mindbut across the nearly four decades that have elapsed since then, I have found peace a more captivating topic. My belief is that a careful study of peace will have a far greater unifying effect than even the most exhaustive excavation of the horrors of war. Living a life at peace, and being a people of peace, is how problems get solved.
My highest aim in writing down the words of this story? It is that you will fully know and fully live with the peace that I have found. If we shall meet at some point in the future, face-to-face, do you know how elated I would be to hear that my story pointed you to peace? There could be no greater compliment, I assure you!
A final duo of admissions before you begin. First, while I wish my memory were sharper for occasions now four decades old, perhaps it is Gods grace in my life that at times, while working to recreate scenes and events for you, I pondered and strained and came up short. When possible, I consulted relevant parties, in an effort to present the most accurate picture of how things went, but I acknowledge openly that because my story has been told thousands of times by as many storytellers, some of the information I present in these chapters will surely fail to square with the other accounts that exist. I stand behind what I have written here.
Second, I have been told by my friends who are fluent in English that I speak in a very distinct manner, one that is not commonplace in the world today. Oh, yes! I say with a giggle, I have heard this many times before! As you might guess, I grew up speaking Vietnamese, which is still the tongue that comes easiest for me. Later on, my story took me to Cuba, which explains how I am also fairly well versed in Spanish, and then to Canada, though I still am woefully ignorant of French. While living in Toronto, one of the most diverse cities in all the world, I began to study English, and while I truly applied myselfCome, now, Kim, I would exhort myself, you must get this right!it is not a simple language to grasp. So many rules! So many exceptions! So many confusing conjugations to recall!
My writing partner, my editor, my publisher, and my agent all have assured me that my book indeed makes sense, but just in case a few stumbles and bumbles slip through our collective cracks, I ask you to forgive the mistakes as mine.