In 2005, Elizabeth McLean quit her job in Canada, sold her apartment and came to Viet Nam on her own. The journey not only offered new adventures, it also enriched her writing career. Six years later her first historical fiction book, Imagining Viet Nam, won the Impress Prize for New Writers 2011. McLean unveils to journalist Nguyen Phan Que Mai the path which led to her experiences in Viet Nam. Inner Sanctum: Elizabeth McLean, when did you first hear about Viet Nam and what made you move to Viet Nam to live and work? I first heard about Viet Nam in the 1970's, when I saw students demonstrating on the campus of the University of Toronto against the American Government sending troops to Viet Nam, and when I read about young Americans escaping to Canada to avoid being drafted into the US army. Some three decades later, on a walk not far from my home in Ottawa, I passed a large villa which turned out to be the Embassy of Viet Nam. On an impulse, I went in, told the woman at the … [Read more...] about Culture, traditions inspire Canadian writer