Thi Bui
Thi Bui is a Vietnamese American author and artist best known for her graphic memoir The Best We Could Do, published in 2017, which became a New York Times bestseller and is widely regarded as one of the most significant works of graphic nonfiction about the Vietnamese refugee experience. Born in Vietnam in 1975, she was among the hundreds of thousands of refugees who fled the country in the years following the fall of Saigon, eventually settling in the United States with her family.
Bui grew up in various locations in the United States and earned her B.A. from UC Berkeley and her M.F.A. in art from the California College of Arts. She worked as a teacher and artist before turning her attention to the graphic memoir form, spending years researching and drawing The Best We Could Do, a project that required her to interview her parents about their experiences during the Vietnam War — experiences they had largely kept from their children.
The Best We Could Do interweaves the story of Bui’s parents’ lives in war-torn Vietnam with the story of her own experience becoming a mother in the United States and trying to understand the inheritance she carries. The book’s watercolor-inflected artwork and its willingness to hold pain and beauty simultaneously have made it both a literary achievement and an educational touchstone. It is required reading in high schools and universities across the country in courses on immigration, Asian American studies, and graphic narrative.
Bui has been an artist-in-residence at various institutions and a contributing artist to the Displaced Nation project. She continues to make art, teach, and advocate for immigrant communities, and is recognized as a pioneering figure in the genre of Asian American graphic memoir.
