• In the Shadow of the Banyan

  • A Novel
  • By: Vaddey Ratner
  • Narrated by: Greta Lee
  • Length: 13 hrs and 19 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (519 ratings)

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In the Shadow of the Banyan  By  cover art

In the Shadow of the Banyan

By: Vaddey Ratner
Narrated by: Greta Lee
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Publisher's summary

Told from the tender perspective of a young girl who comes of age amid the Cambodian killing fields, this searing first novel - based on the author’s personal story - has been hailed by Little Bee author Chris Cleave as “a masterpiece… utterly heartbreaking and impossibly beautiful.”

For seven-year-old Raami, the shattering end of childhood begins with the footsteps of her father returning home in the early dawn hours bringing details of the civil war that has overwhelmed the streets of Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital. Soon the family’s world of carefully guarded royal privilege is swept up in the chaos of revolution and forced exodus.

Over the next four years, as she endures the deaths of family members, starvation, and brutal forced labor, Raami clings to the only remaining vestige of childhood - the mythical legends and poems told to her by her father. In a climate of systematic violence where memory is sickness and justification for execution, Raami fights for her improbable survival. Displaying the author’s extraordinary gift for language, In the Shadow of the Banyan is testament to the transcendent power of narrative and a brilliantly wrought tale of human resilience.

©2012 Vaddey Ratner (P)2012 Simon & Schuster

Critic reviews

"This stunning memorial expresses not just the terrors ofthe Khmer Rouge but also the beauty of what was lost. A hauntingly powerful novel imbued with the richness of old Cambodian lore, the devastation of monumental loss, and the spirit of survival." ( Publishers Weekly)
"Vaddey Ratner's novel is ravishing in its ability to humanize and personalize the Cambodian genocide of the 1970s. She makes us look unflinchingly at the evil that humankind is capable of, but she gives us a child to hold our hand - an achingly believable child - so that we won't be overwhelmed. As we have passed from one century of horrors and been plunged into a new century giving us more of the same, In the Shadow of the Banyan is a truly important literary event." (Robert Olen Butler, author of A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain)
"Often lyrical, sometimes a bit ponderous: a painful,personal record of Cambodia's holocaust." ( Kirkus Reviews)

What listeners say about In the Shadow of the Banyan

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

A Terrible Tale from A Beautiful Storywriter

Different approach to telling the horror story of the Communist take over of Cambodia between 1975-'79, and the merciless slaughter of nearly 1/3 of the population (about 3 million) by the Khmer Rouge. The author relies on her own experiences as a child observing the atrocities, but chooses to use a fictional approach, telling the story through the eyes of a 7 yr. old female character named Raami, instead of exclusively using her personal memories to create the story. Ratner's style is poetic and artistic, and she tells much of the story through metaphors and similies--using the folklore, mythology, Buddhist poetry and fables, and the stories of her caretakers and poetic father to make any sense of what is happening, as observed by a child that has never known fear, pain, or monsters other than mythical dragons.

Ratner doesn't go into great detail compared with other books I've read about Phnom Penh and the Khmer Rouge, but the overall barbarism and senseless chaos recounted through the eyes of a child whose childhood has turned into a nightmare, ratchets the violence and fear up to another level that is heartbreaking and sickening. Raami's is a royal family, described as *Our family is like a bouquet, each stem and blossom perfectly arranged.* In the middle of a celebration, they are torn from the palatial home, separated, and thrown into the crowds of human despair by the brutal regime. The familial bonds, the respect for life, and the ability to pull strength and hope from nowhere add a sense of inspiration to what could have been a completely depressing novel.

There is a scene where a rice farmer is carving a small wooden calf, he says it is to hang around the neck of the mother cow that constantly cries *maaa maaa* mourning the death of her calf. The farmer tells Raami he is making the little wooden calf to hang around the neck of the cow so she "will have somewhere for her sorrow to go." The tremendous sorrow and loss is often expressed in beautiful passages like this that made the reading often meditative. Even with such meaningful writing and disturbing subject, there is a sense of recollection in the telling, an overriding distance that seems sometimes removed from emotion, and an insight and style that seems years beyond a 7 year olds, that combined made it difficult for me to genuinely connect with the storyteller, Raami. It didn't detract from the story, just my depth of involvement with the emotional side of Raami's experience--but no regrets. The narration fits the story and the character of Raami well. A timeless story that should be told and remembered.

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15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Beautifully Written Heatbreaking Must Read!

In the Shadow of the Banyan, by Vaddey Ratner, is the "sleeper" novel-memoir of the summer. This semi-autobiographical novel about the life of one child and her family, in Cambodia, during the regime of Pol Pot, is a must read that the listener will never forget! It is an exquisitely written and powerful account of life and death in the killing fields of Cambodia and the power of a father's love through his self-sacrifice in order that his family, most importantly his children, could endure and survive, both physically and spiritually, through the four years of mass genocide and torture of the Cambodian people under the regime of Pol Pot.

Vaddey Ratner's own story, written as a novel, is both extremely powerful and gut wrenching. The story spans the four years of the Pol Pot regime. Written in the first person voice of the young Raami, and narrated over the four years of her life, begins when Raami is 5, living a life of privilege as a princess in Phnom Penh, and then quickly moves through the 4 years of extreme deprivation, starvation and death of the Cambodian people in the killing fields of Cambodia, under the Pol Pot regime.

The author's story is one that you will never forget. It is among one the most beautifully written contemporary novels that I have listened to on Audible in the over 10 years that I have been a member! It is a novel that must not be missed, both for the story and an understanding, in the lyrical and poetic writing of the author, of the suffering of the Cambodian people during the holocaust that they endured. Like her father, who was famous poet in Cambodia, the author, Vaddey Ratner, has a true gift for writing that lives, in her, through her father.

In the Shadow of the Banyan is written tribute to the 1 to 2 million Cambodians who died in the killing fields during the regime of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, and to her father, who gave her, through his own sacrifice, the gift to endure the unendurable and to hope when there was none!



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6 people found this helpful

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Listening is perfect for this story

While reading the novel would be riveting, listening to it performed is a moving, exquisite experience. Hearing the Khmer words woven into the text makes the reader feel more involved in the country and culture. Unlike some of the other works about the toxic revolution in Cambodia, this book does not focus solely on the physical violence, blood, and gore until the end. Even then, it portrays anarchy and evil in a manner that allows the reader to stay with the story. Perhaps this makes the situation more disturbing, if that is possible.

What emerges is a the portrayal of a gracious and beautiful culture whose destruction is beyond comprehension. However, the grace and hope that is described in the book makes one admire and honor the survivors.

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4 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

A story of family love and shocking circumstances

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

It is an important story, but lessened by the choice of a western sounding voice to tell the story.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Greta Lee?

The author, herself, or someone sounding like the author should have put the story into the minds of the listener.

Did In the Shadow of the Banyan inspire you to do anything?

The re-telling of this story made me thank the people of the churches in the Boston area who brought Cambodian refugees to the USA in the 1980's from refugee camps in Thailand. I met the refugees there, I- a new teacher of English as a second language, and they- the hurt and hopeful immigrants. They told me these stories first-hand. They changed my life and changed my opinion my own countrymen. God bless them all.

Any additional comments?

The escape attempts from the work camps and the rules against having unauthorized food (found eggs, etc.) are other stories of bravery that should be told. Perhaps other Cambodians would please fill in the blanks from your experience or from the experiences of your parents.

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3 people found this helpful

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    4 out of 5 stars
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Unfathomable depths of sadness

Beautiful and horrific all at once and combined. The almost unimaginable horrors this small child had to live through, that most humans could not comprehend, are told in exquisite and often poetic detail. This is a story of a dismantling of a country and a society, and the family that she loses can almost be seen as a metaphor for the entire four years of the reign of terror the Khmer Rouge.

Often times disturbing, this might not be everyone. But it is like a history lesson, and a lesson and example as to the inhumanity that is still contained within humanity.

The narration is very good, but just a little lacking, considering the drama there was to work with in the story. But I enjoyed it, and it has taken a few days of reflection before I could attempt this review, for the simple fact that the story is haunting me and will for a while.

Thank you Vaddey Rutner for being so brave to retell this story. The strength you showed just surviving those horrors lives on. You are a special human being.

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I never new..

This was a hard story to listen to. I do not know history very well and this is a story of the people of Cambodia and what they endured under Kymur Rouge. It is important to know these events. The narrator has you believing s he is the young girl, the prose is poetic at times, almost lyrical, and has you moving through a range of emotions as we care for the characters. It is stunning in all ways.

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Life when one accepts

Informative-scary-thought provoking - seen through the eyes of a child. Feel it's important to understand the past of each country as the world grows smaller.

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Fell short of five stars

Where does In the Shadow of the Banyan rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

All the good things written about this book have great substance. My slight disappointment was only in the fact that there was room to show and tell much, much more depth of the atrocities and horror perpetrated by the Khmer Rouge.

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    4 out of 5 stars

Don't Give Up; It All Comes Together

I had to restart this story twice before I decided to just go with it. I found it to be well worth it. The story follows a young girl as she faces so much turmoil with wavering strength, but as the story continues I felt closer and wondered how she would get through it all. In the end the story was not as much about the stories her father told her but the unfolding of a family story.

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Enjoyed is not the word for such a harrowing tale.

But this book held my attention every minute and I thought the narrator was professional and sympathetic.
There was nothing about it I would change. I cried even in parts and I don't normally do that with a book. Worth every minutes listening and every cent paid.

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