Viet Thanh Nguyen argues that "all wars are fought twice, the first time on the battlefield, the second time in memory." In a war smothered in lies, silence and misinformation, how does the writer of that war, misnamed the "Vietnam War," claim to be the bearer of truth? How can we recall the past in a way that does justice to the forgotten, the oppressed, the dead, the ghosts? We will attempt to answer such questions in our study of Nguyen's fiction and nonfiction. We will contemplate what is true and how we as readers can tell. This poses a sticky question, especially since portrayals of this war have been, by default, monopolized by certain participants. Students will blend the critical and the creative in their responses to the readings, and they will complete a final project of their own design.