The Committed is a historical novel by American novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen. It was published in 2021 by Grove Press as the second in a series. The novel was preceded by The Sympathizer, which was a commercial success and won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Set in the 1980s, the narrator arrives in Paris after boarding a Vietnamese refugee boat at the end of the previous book. Together with his brother, they embrace this new capitalist world as they continuously battle the traumas of their past lives. They resort to selling drugs in the street of Paris. The narrator eventually befriends a clique of intellectuals who introduce to him to a whole new world of crime.
The Committed is a thrilling novel full of controversial politics and satirical humor. Critics praised the novel as being far more enticing than the previous book. Despite the political rhetoric, the author doesn't take a side, and neither does he portray either side favorably, instead the book chooses to question everything.
