The Lotus Eaters Audiobook By Tatjana Soli cover art

The Lotus Eaters

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The Lotus Eaters

By: Tatjana Soli
Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
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It's 1975 and the North Vietnamese army is poised to roll into Saigon. As the city falls into chaos, two lovers make their way across the city to escape to a new life. Helen Adams, an American photojournalist, must take leave of a devastated country she has come to love. Nguyen Pran Linh, the man who loves her, must deal with his own conflicted loyalties. As they race through the streets, they play out a drama of love and betrayal that began 12 years before. Their mentor, the larger-than-life war correspondent Sam Darrow, was once Helen’s infuriating lover and fiercest competitor, as well as Linh’s secret keeper, protector, and truest friend. As the sun sets on their life in Saigon, Helen and Linh struggle against both their inner demons and the ghosts of the past, illuminating the horrors of war, the dangers of obsession, and the redemptive power of love.

©2010 Tatjana Soli (P)2010 Blackstone Audio, Inc. Historical Fiction Veteran Creators War Fiction Heartfelt Adventure Scary Space Opera Science Fiction

Critic reviews

"The novel is steeped in history, yet gorgeous sensory details enliven the prose….35 years after the fall of Saigon, Soli’s entrancing debut brings you close enough to feel a part of it." ( People magazine)
Vivid Descriptions • Compelling Characters • Soothing Voice • Historical Authenticity • Emotional Depth • Superb Reading

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Soli writes with passion, not merely of what we expect--red dirt and thick canopied jungle and the Casablanca-seediness of a French province in decay--but of the quiet moments that bonded a love triangle.

The war weary photographer, running his foot along the edge of the precipice is a familiar one, but he is joined by a colleague and lover. There is a third member of the triangle. It is not the estranged wife bottled up in a ranch-style house in the US--although she does appear--but the Vietnamese 'native guide' who respects him, loves her, and is torn by the Vietnamese civil war.

Soli, like her characters, is best when away from the war, protecting what is left. There is a scene in Cambodia's Angor Wat where the great trees are breaking the stone temples apart as if they were fresh bread, and again in the spidery capillaries of the Mekong, on a small sacred island, where the Buddhist dead replenish the soil and nurture orchids.

The performance is good, with a touch of Kathleen Turner's weary sultry voice, which, unfortunately, reflects the prose as both the writing and voice crackle with static in the more passionate moments.

A female journalists' view of the Vietnam War

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Some books are great IRL but don't transfer to audio very well; this is one of them. Something about the structure of the paragraphs makes it difficult to follow in this format. To make matters worse, the narrator is unnecessarily breathy and straining. I wish I could return it.

disappointing

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There is an irony in the war photographers' quest for personal achievement and acclaim being so petty in comparison to the scope of combat atrocities photographed and personal risk endured to get the pictures.

Well written and well performed.

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I love novels about Asia, especially about the fall-out from European colonialism -- novels set in Asia or written by Asians. I was very disappointed by Chang-Rae Lee's "The Surrendered" but Soli's book just leaves me wanting more. I want to enter into the world of her characters, as enthralled with them and their Viet Nam as they are with the war that surrounds them. I listened to this book as an audio recording and left many things undone in the days that it took me to listen to all of it.

"The Lotus Eaters" is extraordinarily well-written, from the lyricism of the individual sentences to the taught construction of the story, beginning near the end, then going back ten years to tell the middle of the story, and finishing when Saigon falls in 1975. I knew, from the first chapters, that Helen would fall in love with Linh, that they would be wretched apart at the end of the war, that she would stay behind in Saigon without him. But the middle of the story was compelling nonetheless, to learn how Helen grew into her own as a war reporter and how she fell in love with two men, who both represented some aspect of the Viet Nam war. We have Sam Darrow, the American photojournalist who has become addicted to the thrill of the battle and is oblivious to almost everything outside his viewfinder; and then there's Linh -- for me, the more mysterious and compelling figure -- a Vietnamese poet and spy who loves Helen for long years before his love is returned. Love between a White woman and an Asian man is not frequently explored in literature or art, making this book unusual in that the love affair between the Americans Helen and Darrow is a precursor to the central romance of the book, that of Helen and Linh. The improbability of their love -- as improbable as anything good coming out of war -- makes for one of the most compelling romance stories I have ever read.

Best book I've read yet this year

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One of the best books I've listened to -- you will get caught up in these characters and this story.

Intense narrative from Vietnam War days

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