Subscriber Letter 4: Special Thanks, Recommendations and Books I am Reading

This is my fourth subscriber letter. I enjoyed your response to books I’ve been reading, and a couple people responded with more books to add to my reading list. It’s also nice to have the internal blog housekeeping all in one place to address quickly, so you subscribers have one post to read instead of ten. 

Writing Schedule

The decision to write twice a week was a bit too ambitious. Recent articles took longer to research than I’d planned and I need to ensure I spend enough time with family. The best way to keep this sustainable is to post mainly on weekends, with only the occasional weekday post as inspiration strikes.

Subscriber Growth and some Special Thanks

Subscriber growth this month was a very pleasant surprise along with a couple major happenings. The rate of growth shot up tremendously since the last letter. If you look at that big spike in the center of the chart below, it corresponds to the day that Yaw of Yaw's Brief: Guns, Trade, Cobalt & Africa Beyond Colonialism restacked one of my articles in his notes. 

If you are not subscribed to his newsletter, you should check him out. He has an incredible grasp of economics and history. Although he focuses on Africa, the principles can be applied universally. I find I am a little better informed after reading one of his articles. 

Here is a chart of new subscribers each day, additional followers add about 25% to this number.

Following this uptick in viewers, some sort of algorithm must have kicked in. Prior to the beginning of June, subscriber growth was around one to two new subscribers a week. In June, it picked up to mostly one or two new subscribers a day and in the beginning of July, it picked up to between two and eight new subscribers a day. Everyone new to this blog, I give a hearty welcome and thank you for your subscription. All of you have been a tremendous source of inspiration. 

Through your subscriptions, I’ve discovered many interesting writers to subscribe to who may have otherwise slipped under my radar. I check out everyone who subscribes and have been very pleased. You’ve given me great joy, because I now find so many interesting articles to read from so many different points of view. If I missed you, please send me a message. Unfortunately, I am not notified of followers, so please subscribe if you would like me to find you. The sudden attention is a bit overwhelming and I fear I may have missed some great writers.

I’ve been a bit busy and otherwise distracted these past couple weeks, but now, I am back on track. 

• I took a short vacation to explore the Malaysian financial hub of Kuala Lumpur..

• I became obsessed with some horrible editing on my part, discovered while listening to audio of older articles. My obsessive brain wouldn’t let me rest until they were cleaned up. 

• Finally, a friend has been kind enough to begin coaching me about how to be a more effective writer.

My second big thank you is to John Pearce of An Expat's Thoughts on Life. He’s been incredibly generous to provide some much-needed criticism (in the kindest way possible) opening my eyes to a few of my chronic writing errors. John’s writing contains wonderful insights to be gleaned as he deals with family life, U.S. immigration, or dealing with the countless cultural challenges which come from relocating from the U.S. to such a dramatically different culture. He came to Substack shortly after I did and is helping fill in the Vietnamese blogging space to add some much-needed content where there were only a few writers before. He still hasn’t found the love of the Substack algorithm, probably because it seems to wait several months to kick in. If you haven’t already, please give him a read and some love. 

This last mention is a new recommendation of what I consider to be the best podcast about Vietnam for expats. Matt of The Bureau Asia, has recently joined Substack to share some of his Australian charm in some well-produced and highly informative podcasts. He only arrived on this site a couple weeks ago and is already making some waves. He has lived in Vietnam since 2010 and has the experience to tell some good stories about the country. I enjoy his funny and upbeat attitude. He already brought with him hundreds of subscribers, but his likes and comments are still a little slow. I am sure he would appreciate some love as well. Check him out and give him some likes or a little welcome in the comments. 

The most recent book haul

The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh. I am only a short way into the book. It is an emotionally heavy read. There are many stories of American soldiers dealing with the difficulties of war after they have had some time to process their emotions following their return to civilian life, but this book is interesting because it was written by someone fighting for the Vietnamese side.

Here are a couple books about some of the tribal people of Vietnam, Vestiges of Champa Civilization by Trần Kỳ Phương and Ethnic Minorities in Vietnam by Dang Nghiem Van, Chu Thai Son and Luu Hung. Those of you who have been following for a while know that I have been very interested in the Cham people. I have threatened to write an article but have not gotten around to it. Maybe these books will finally give the push I need.

Another wonderful book by Hữu Ngọc, Viet Nam, Tradition and Change. From the last book haul, I am sure many have realized I am a big fan of his writing. Read that letter to see why. This was an earlier book and I am sure it holds some amazing nuggets of knowledge.

I am a sucker for history books. The title of this book is A brief Chronology of Vietnamese History by Hà Văn Thư and Trần Hồng Đức. Much of my knowledge has been from online sources and I have found it to be unreliable (to be gracious). Hopefully there are some nuggets to glean to help clear up some grey areas.

Each of these books is published by Thế Giới Publishers under the Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. I know many of these books are not widely available outside of Vietnam, although some can be found in the public domain section of Internet Archive.org. If you cannot find these where you are, please message me and I will ask the publisher to list copies on Amazon or offer them as eBooks. 

Thank you for subscribing. I wish you a wonderful month and will look forward to reading your future comments on my work. 

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