I re-read The Things They Carried for book club a few months ago.  It is a stunning book, and I’m completely in awe of Tim O’Brien.  So, my TBR pile has gotten a little taller, since discovering that he had this to say about The Lotus Eaters by Tatjana Soli:

“Set amid the twin infernos of Cambodia and Vietnam in the early 1970’s, The Lotus Eaters draws the reader into a haunting world of war, betrayal, courage, obsession, and love. Tatjana Soli’s spare, lucid prose infuses this novel with a dramatic clarity that makes us eyewitnesses to the collapse of two civilizations. More than that, The Lotus Eaters helps us to see and hear and feel the terrible human costs of that conflagration.” 

—Tim O’Brien, National Book Award-winning author 

From Historical Novel Society:

The Lotus Eaters is one of the most honest, endearing, searing, and intriguing stories about the Vietnam War that I have ever read and as far as I’m concerned, one of the finest novels of the Vietnam era. It goes so much deeper and wider than a typical “war is hell” story. Tatjana Soli has caught the essence of this devastating conflict and the loves that ensue during and after the destruction it wrought. Highly recommended. —Viviane Crystal

I love hearing Tatjana talk about the story and her research for the book in the trailer.

The Lotus Eaters was a New York Times Notable Book in 2010, and is about a woman who begins her career as a photographer in Vietnam during the war.

What’s on your To Be Read pile?