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On the Fox Roads
While learning the ropes from a crafty Jazz Age bank robber, a young stowaway discovers their authentic self, a hidden gift, and that there are no straight lines when you run the fox roads…
29 pages, ebook
First published October 31, 2023
About the author
Nghi Vo
37 books3,682 followersNghi Vo is the author of the acclaimed novellas The Empress of Salt and Fortune and When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain. Born in Illinois, she now lives on the shores of Lake Michigan. She believes in the ritual of lipstick, the power of stories, and the right to change your mind. The Chosen and the Beautiful is her debut novel.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 114 reviews
May 6, 2024
Not my favorite thing by Nghi Vo but still a fun story. It was fast paced and very different from most of her other work. It seems to take place in our world in 1930s America. Fox roads, as I suspected from the title, are the spirit paths from Asian mythology. It's a short story so I will leave it there.
November 12, 2023
Huli Jing in the American midwest.
On the Fox Roads is a story by Nghi Vo, available free from tor.com here. It tells the story of twentieth century bank robbers Chinese Jack and Tonkin Jill Lai and our first-person narrator. The narrator is a teenage Chinese-American girl. If her name was ever mentioned, I missed it. Lai calls her "em yêu", which is Vietnamese for "darling" or "honey". As bank-robbers Jack and Lai and Honey have an advantage, because they can use the Fox Roads, which take them away from where they robbed the bank to some new and distant location.
On writing this review, I realized that, embarrassingly, I have learned about Asian fox spirits only from reading about them in fantasy by North American writers, such as Guy Gavriel Kay, Ken Liu and one or two others whose names I do not at the moment recall. And now I can add Nghi Vo to the list. The versions most familiar to me are Chinese Huli Jing (狐狸精), Korean kumiho (구미호), and Japanese kitsune (狐). (Kitsune is just the Japanese word for an ordinary fox like the little red foxes you see out in the countryside, which have just one tail apiece, and as far as I know are not immortal, but have lifespans on the order of four years, and do not turn into bewitching women who drain men's souls. To be honest, I've never checked, not being personally concerned, but that just sounds like the kind of story men make up to disguise their own inadequacies.) Honestly, I would barely know where to start looking for the original stories, which makes me sad.
At any rate, this is a beautiful story that adds to my visions of diasporic fox spirits.
Blog review.
On the Fox Roads is a story by Nghi Vo, available free from tor.com here. It tells the story of twentieth century bank robbers Chinese Jack and Tonkin Jill Lai and our first-person narrator. The narrator is a teenage Chinese-American girl. If her name was ever mentioned, I missed it. Lai calls her "em yêu", which is Vietnamese for "darling" or "honey". As bank-robbers Jack and Lai and Honey have an advantage, because they can use the Fox Roads, which take them away from where they robbed the bank to some new and distant location.
On writing this review, I realized that, embarrassingly, I have learned about Asian fox spirits only from reading about them in fantasy by North American writers, such as Guy Gavriel Kay, Ken Liu and one or two others whose names I do not at the moment recall. And now I can add Nghi Vo to the list. The versions most familiar to me are Chinese Huli Jing (狐狸精), Korean kumiho (구미호), and Japanese kitsune (狐). (Kitsune is just the Japanese word for an ordinary fox like the little red foxes you see out in the countryside, which have just one tail apiece, and as far as I know are not immortal, but have lifespans on the order of four years, and do not turn into bewitching women who drain men's souls. To be honest, I've never checked, not being personally concerned, but that just sounds like the kind of story men make up to disguise their own inadequacies.) Honestly, I would barely know where to start looking for the original stories, which makes me sad.
At any rate, this is a beautiful story that adds to my visions of diasporic fox spirits.
Blog review.
December 6, 2023
It doesn’t matter if you’re coming across Lake Michigan from Indiana as the ice cracks under your tires or if you’re trying to make it to Cicero on roads that were never paved for cars. The fox roads don’t care about winter snow or summer storms, and maybe they bow to the gods of Tornado Alley, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
The fox roads take you through October, before they cut down the corn and before the trees undress for winter, and they can take you anywhere.
All you need, she told me, is a reason to get out.
I absolutely love the world Nghi Vo has built here, in Siren Queen, in What the Dead Know - this just pre-war, magical world that mirrors our own but with differences that make wonder out of the everyday.
Find it free from Tor here: https://www.tor.com/2023/10/31/on-the...
And I'd strongly encourage checking out the rest.
The fox roads take you through October, before they cut down the corn and before the trees undress for winter, and they can take you anywhere.
All you need, she told me, is a reason to get out.
I absolutely love the world Nghi Vo has built here, in Siren Queen, in What the Dead Know - this just pre-war, magical world that mirrors our own but with differences that make wonder out of the everyday.
Find it free from Tor here: https://www.tor.com/2023/10/31/on-the...
And I'd strongly encourage checking out the rest.
January 17, 2024
my love for nghi vo is such that i will go willingly, unquestionably, devotedly wherever she wants to take me. and this time she said come on a trip with me to the midwest in the early twentieth century. you’ll meet a young stowaway with a gift and jazz age bank robbers. it will speak astutely and with nuance about anti-asian racism. it will be queer and speak (to you personally) about self-discovery. and you’ll learn that there truly are no straight lines when you run the fox roads.
i could only say yes.
this short story (novelette?) felt like what i’m considering to be trademark nghi vo: magical, lyrical, dreamy, but with an edge of sharpness and an underlying sense of wildness. by the time on the fox roads fully unfurled itself, i could only go oh. it snuck up on me and stole my breath as assuredly as its characters, chinese jack and tonkin jill lai, rob banks.
it occurred to me that after i completely and utterly devoured this, i no doubt missed a myriad of subtleties and intricacies. but what a glorious excuse i have to go back and read this gem again and again and again.
available to read for free here.
i could only say yes.
this short story (novelette?) felt like what i’m considering to be trademark nghi vo: magical, lyrical, dreamy, but with an edge of sharpness and an underlying sense of wildness. by the time on the fox roads fully unfurled itself, i could only go oh. it snuck up on me and stole my breath as assuredly as its characters, chinese jack and tonkin jill lai, rob banks.
it occurred to me that after i completely and utterly devoured this, i no doubt missed a myriad of subtleties and intricacies. but what a glorious excuse i have to go back and read this gem again and again and again.
available to read for free here.
December 7, 2023
I don't think I can be objective when it comes to Nghi Vo anymore, I just love her writing so damn much.
This is a lovely short story and you can read it for free: https://www.tor.com/2023/10/31/on-the...
This is a lovely short story and you can read it for free: https://www.tor.com/2023/10/31/on-the...
May 19, 2024
Only got interesting near the end.
June 12, 2024
Anger and a snap decision leads a young Chinese person to find their true self while robbing banks in the 1920s Midwest and escaping via fantastical "fox roads" with their co-conspirators, Jack and Lai. This was a fun, vibe-y story - kind of a classic outlaw story, but with a Chinese mythology twist, queer perspective and an uncommon setting that gives it a nice spin.
The narrator's decision about whether or not to keep on with their life of crime comes around pretty quick at the end but I'll forgive it.
Like most of her stuff, Vo's story feels a little open-ended, like it could be continued. But it also ends well where it does. I enjoyed this one as much as her longer novellas.
The narrator's decision about whether or not to keep on with their life of crime comes around pretty quick at the end but I'll forgive it.
Like most of her stuff, Vo's story feels a little open-ended, like it could be continued. But it also ends well where it does. I enjoyed this one as much as her longer novellas.
April 11, 2024
“It’s a hard thing to stay in a form that’s not your own, even when you love the people who know you in it.”
With her usual whimsical and beautiful writing, Nghi Vo has written a novelette set in the Jazz Age about a young stowaway who decides to join a twosome of bank robbers with the ability to take the fox roads to escape. It’s a 29-page story with Asian mythology about self-discovery of one’s own identity and that manifests the racism suffered by the Asian population in the United States.
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May 23, 2024
Fully teared up at the end. Love the writing, love the era, love the concept, love the setting. I read this sort of expecting to be disappointed bc everything I’ve read by Vo I’ve loved and I figured it couldn’t last, but this was a ton of fun with a heartfelt ending, and it was fantastic.
June 6, 2024
On the Fox Roads is a short story, but is filled with a large amount of vibrancy and atmosphere. Nghi Vo is one of my favorite authors. Her stories always feel unique and magical. I love the queer representation throughout her works. This is just another example of her solid story writing skills. It is a fun, quick read with a cool world and memorable characters. Definitely worth the short amount of time it will take to read.
December 25, 2023
weird
Sometimes it is so hard to understand what is happening in a Nghi Vo story until the very end, and even then I’m left sitting there contemplating all the little threads. This is one of those stories. It’s weird and fascinating and an interesting blend of myth/magic.
Sometimes it is so hard to understand what is happening in a Nghi Vo story until the very end, and even then I’m left sitting there contemplating all the little threads. This is one of those stories. It’s weird and fascinating and an interesting blend of myth/magic.
January 11, 2024
Really beautiful. This world is fascinating.
November 5, 2023
This short story was phenomenal, and one of my favorites of Nghi Vi's works that I've read so far.
Hopefully without giving much away since I'm taking it out of context, my favorite quote is everything and it's this:
"It’s a hard thing to stay in a form that’s not your own, even when you love the people who know you in it. It feels like flying when you can be what you really are, even if you love"...(edited to avoid spoilers, fill in with: "particular aspects of that alternate form.")
This story is available on Tor's website as part of the announcement of a further three books coming in the Singing Hills Cycle, and I couldn't be more excited for more creative inspiration and cathartic sadness and joy.
Hopefully without giving much away since I'm taking it out of context, my favorite quote is everything and it's this:
"It’s a hard thing to stay in a form that’s not your own, even when you love the people who know you in it. It feels like flying when you can be what you really are, even if you love"...(edited to avoid spoilers, fill in with: "particular aspects of that alternate form.")
This story is available on Tor's website as part of the announcement of a further three books coming in the Singing Hills Cycle, and I couldn't be more excited for more creative inspiration and cathartic sadness and joy.
November 15, 2023
Really enjoyed this. This would be a great film if you fleshed out the characters a bit more. Love me some bank robbing and capers, and the fantastical twist on this was a lot of fun. And it has a great heart in there, too.
December 29, 2023
short but this was so so good
definitely need to read more from this author
definitely need to read more from this author
July 16, 2024
Glad I checked this out. I do really love anything Nghi Vo writes. This was a kind of Asian Bonnie & Clyde story with some mythic elements. I was reminded a bit of Seanan McGuire's Wayward Children series.
August 11, 2024
On the Fox Roads: Almost a favourite. Beautiful, evocative language, moving worldbuilding, effortless and sad.
(Part of Hugo Finalists 2024 read-through.)
(Part of Hugo Finalists 2024 read-through.)
June 7, 2024
Unlike the popular image of the infamous Bonnie and Clyde, “Chinese Jack” and “Tonkin Jill” didn’t ENTER banks with guns blazing. That didn’t mean they didn’t EXIT that way, but the guns weren’t the point.
Jack and Lai were merely following the rule laid down by their contemporary Willie Sutton, they robbed banks because that’s where the money was. Even if the kind of small-town banks that the Chinese duo robbed had a lot less of the green stuff and a lot more of other kinds of paper than either of the robbers would have liked.
That’s where the third member of this duo turned trio enters the picture, a young Chinese-American girl who stows away in their getaway car intending to steal back the deed to her parents’ store from one of the “Jack and Jill’s” earlier scores.
A seemingly magical deed that will re-open the store as soon as the deed is laid down on the ground it belongs to.
The question is whether that stowaway wants to go back to belonging to it, to being the girl their parents want them to be, prim, proper and most of all – obedient – or whether that girl wants to undergo more than one transformation – robbing banks, driving getaway cars, getting to see the big, wide world, living as a man instead of the woman that fate originally intended.
All things are possible on the magical, mysterious, ever-changing fox roads that travel no known path and go in no known direction except for the will and the whim of anyone who is on the run from a hard chase and desperate enough to drive fast and trust to fate.
Escape Rating A: This is one of those stories where my only complaint is that I wanted just a bit more than I got. Every single bit of this one is terrific, but I wish it had qualified as a Hugo nominee in the Novella category (between 17,500 and 40,000 words) instead of as the Novelette it is (between 7,500 and 17,500 words). Not that I actually WANT more options in the Novella category because it’s going to be a really hard choice for me.
On the Fox Roads is one of those book baby situations, where it feels like it owes some of its DNA to several books I’ve read – and probably more that I haven’t – but at the same time is still a thing of itself meaning that the blend creates something new and marvelous.
Bonnie and Clyde in a photo from around 1932–33 that was found by police at an abandoned hideout
In this particular case it reads like it owes something to, first of all, the real Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, both in the way that Jack and Lai operate and in the setting, small-town America during the Great Depression just as Prohibition is about to change everything.
But the story also has a bit of The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo in that one of the characters is a fox masquerading as a human, who is someone with a somewhat different set of morés and values than the human narrator and the fox’s human partner Jack.
And then there’s that third element, the fox roads themselves, which read a lot like the roads to alternate realities traveled by the magical muscle car in Max Gladstone’s Last Exit.
Those impressions were what I brought into this story, what I got while I was reading it was considerably more, as the narrator has the opportunity to try out a much different life than they thought could possibly be available to them as a young Chinese-American woman in racially-stratified 1930s America.
The way that the magic mixed into the heady brew of the story and swept it off down mysterious roads and sometimes equally mysterious and magical cities blended the whole delicious melange into something delightful and unexpected and yes, magical.
To the point where I’m oh-so-grateful that this got nominated for the Hugo, because I’m not much of a short fiction reader and probably wouldn’t have found this otherwise. But I’m glad that I did, even if it does make my Hugo voting that much harder.
Originally published at Reading Reality
Jack and Lai were merely following the rule laid down by their contemporary Willie Sutton, they robbed banks because that’s where the money was. Even if the kind of small-town banks that the Chinese duo robbed had a lot less of the green stuff and a lot more of other kinds of paper than either of the robbers would have liked.
That’s where the third member of this duo turned trio enters the picture, a young Chinese-American girl who stows away in their getaway car intending to steal back the deed to her parents’ store from one of the “Jack and Jill’s” earlier scores.
A seemingly magical deed that will re-open the store as soon as the deed is laid down on the ground it belongs to.
The question is whether that stowaway wants to go back to belonging to it, to being the girl their parents want them to be, prim, proper and most of all – obedient – or whether that girl wants to undergo more than one transformation – robbing banks, driving getaway cars, getting to see the big, wide world, living as a man instead of the woman that fate originally intended.
All things are possible on the magical, mysterious, ever-changing fox roads that travel no known path and go in no known direction except for the will and the whim of anyone who is on the run from a hard chase and desperate enough to drive fast and trust to fate.
Escape Rating A: This is one of those stories where my only complaint is that I wanted just a bit more than I got. Every single bit of this one is terrific, but I wish it had qualified as a Hugo nominee in the Novella category (between 17,500 and 40,000 words) instead of as the Novelette it is (between 7,500 and 17,500 words). Not that I actually WANT more options in the Novella category because it’s going to be a really hard choice for me.
On the Fox Roads is one of those book baby situations, where it feels like it owes some of its DNA to several books I’ve read – and probably more that I haven’t – but at the same time is still a thing of itself meaning that the blend creates something new and marvelous.
Bonnie and Clyde in a photo from around 1932–33 that was found by police at an abandoned hideout
In this particular case it reads like it owes something to, first of all, the real Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, both in the way that Jack and Lai operate and in the setting, small-town America during the Great Depression just as Prohibition is about to change everything.
But the story also has a bit of The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo in that one of the characters is a fox masquerading as a human, who is someone with a somewhat different set of morés and values than the human narrator and the fox’s human partner Jack.
And then there’s that third element, the fox roads themselves, which read a lot like the roads to alternate realities traveled by the magical muscle car in Max Gladstone’s Last Exit.
Those impressions were what I brought into this story, what I got while I was reading it was considerably more, as the narrator has the opportunity to try out a much different life than they thought could possibly be available to them as a young Chinese-American woman in racially-stratified 1930s America.
The way that the magic mixed into the heady brew of the story and swept it off down mysterious roads and sometimes equally mysterious and magical cities blended the whole delicious melange into something delightful and unexpected and yes, magical.
To the point where I’m oh-so-grateful that this got nominated for the Hugo, because I’m not much of a short fiction reader and probably wouldn’t have found this otherwise. But I’m glad that I did, even if it does make my Hugo voting that much harder.
Originally published at Reading Reality
November 1, 2023
"It’s a hard thing to stay in a form that’s not your own, even when you love the people who know you in it."
Wow, I wish this had been fleshed out into a full novel. This was a magical realist short story, brief and poetic, which is where Nghi Vo shines. It's about metamorphosis and self discovery, about queerness and anti-Asian racism in historical America, and about robbing banks and outrunning the cops on mysterious moonlit roads that shouldn't technically exist.
"The fox roads were something else, I realized, as the light drained away and the moon rose in the sky. You only hit the fox roads if you’re running from something."
Wow, I wish this had been fleshed out into a full novel. This was a magical realist short story, brief and poetic, which is where Nghi Vo shines. It's about metamorphosis and self discovery, about queerness and anti-Asian racism in historical America, and about robbing banks and outrunning the cops on mysterious moonlit roads that shouldn't technically exist.
"The fox roads were something else, I realized, as the light drained away and the moon rose in the sky. You only hit the fox roads if you’re running from something."
July 9, 2024
A novelette is just not enough! According to Libby it took me barely half an hour to read this — just enough time to get a feel for the characters and the world, and then it’s over. I LOVED the Midwestern feel of this one, which really resonated with me. Unfortunately I think Vo likes writing short for the same reason I like Vo’s writing: she has a distinctively dense and evocative approach to storytelling, never bogged down in explanations or redundancies. Nothing is actually *missing* from this story, except that I wanted to spend a week on it.
January 21, 2024
Nice short story about bank robbers
A young girl throws in with two bank rubbers in order to get the deed to her family's farm that they stole from a bank.
This is a nice story that was fun to read which is what matters.
A young girl throws in with two bank rubbers in order to get the deed to her family's farm that they stole from a bank.
This is a nice story that was fun to read which is what matters.
April 3, 2024
Every year I read all the finalists of the most prestigious science fiction awards (at least in the English speaking world): the Hugo awards. This story is a finalist in the Novelette category. I had previously read quite a few stories by this author, so I was thrilled to read one more. I was not disappointed.
In this story a young unnamed narrators find herself running away from justice with some bank robbers. She end up learning the ropes of the job, including how to access the mysterious Fox Road.
The style is beautiful, and both worldbuilding and atmosphere creation are great... but not exactly my cup of tea somehow. I am sure many will love it though.
In this story a young unnamed narrators find herself running away from justice with some bank robbers. She end up learning the ropes of the job, including how to access the mysterious Fox Road.
The style is beautiful, and both worldbuilding and atmosphere creation are great... but not exactly my cup of tea somehow. I am sure many will love it though.
April 11, 2024
What a charming little story, like everything Nghi Vo writes, especially when internally (and inaccurately) read with a Transatlantic accent. Without spoilers, I got heart flutters at the comparison of the main character's self-discovery to the folkloric transformation into fox form.
April 17, 2024
oh wow the writing is gorgeous. I figured i could just read it because it was short and free online, but I didn’t expect to like it as much as I did. Definitely need to read some of the authors other books.
March 16, 2024
Nghi Vo can write queer Jazz Age fanfic for me all day any day. (Also excellent: the Venn diagram of her Chinese and Vietnamese characters, the overlapping similarities and the differences.)
July 18, 2024
A solid short story. It was a little confusing at the start but worth it in the end. I love Vo’s writing.
April 1, 2024
GOSH I wanted this to be longer!!
January 3, 2024
4.5/5
May 7, 2024
Reading 2024 Hugo-eligible novels/stories/etc for potential nomination.
On the short list for Best Novelette.
On the short list for Best Novelette.
June 23, 2024
Starting with high-octane action, On the Fox Roads turns into an incredibly atmospheric piece about Jack, Lai and our protagonist embarking upon robbery after robbery in what is almost a travel journal. Set during the height of small-time bank robberies and before the rise of federal laws meant to enable cross-state jurisdictions, adding three Chinese characters with their own circumstances and you have a very condensed tale that could've perhaps been expanded just a bit more in the narrative department.
Motivated by desire to retrieve a deed to her parents' hard-earned shop our protagonist finds herself stalking the dynamic pair of robbers until she's in their car seconds before they make getaway. What follows is a bizarre turn of events as she's invited to join, ordeal lasting a month at the most, until they're amused enough and return the deed to her. Unsatisfied with immigrant's life she agrees and their adventures begin. Cool headed and methodical Jack is paired with easy going, or maniacal if you will, Lai so a third, more balanced person they get to train up is a welcome addition. Romantic tensions flare along the way and we see a look at the period itself. From Chinatowns, to endless plains states and ultimately deciding what do with your life in this new world.
I found rather elaborate and evocative descriptions to be the best part of On the Fox Roads. More so than our protagonist trio by. While never giving a clear year when it takes place, putting together some events and general mood your imagination does much of the heavy lifting.
Motivated by desire to retrieve a deed to her parents' hard-earned shop our protagonist finds herself stalking the dynamic pair of robbers until she's in their car seconds before they make getaway. What follows is a bizarre turn of events as she's invited to join, ordeal lasting a month at the most, until they're amused enough and return the deed to her. Unsatisfied with immigrant's life she agrees and their adventures begin. Cool headed and methodical Jack is paired with easy going, or maniacal if you will, Lai so a third, more balanced person they get to train up is a welcome addition. Romantic tensions flare along the way and we see a look at the period itself. From Chinatowns, to endless plains states and ultimately deciding what do with your life in this new world.
I found rather elaborate and evocative descriptions to be the best part of On the Fox Roads. More so than our protagonist trio by. While never giving a clear year when it takes place, putting together some events and general mood your imagination does much of the heavy lifting.
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