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When We Were Orphans

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When We Were Orphans

Written by: Kazuo Ishiguro
Narrated by: John Lee
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About this listen

 Christopher Banks, an English boy born in early-20th-century Shanghai, is orphaned at age nine when both his mother and father disappear under suspicious circumstances. He grows up to become a renowned detective, and more than 20 years later, returns to Shanghai to solve the mystery of the disappearances.

Within the layers of the narrative told in Christopher's precise, slightly detached voice are revealed what he can't, or wont, see: that the simplest desires, a child's for his parents, a man's for understanding, may give rise to the most complicated truths.

A feat of narrative skill and soaring imagination, When We Were Orphans is Kazuo Ishiguro at his brilliant best.

©2000 Kazuo Ishiguro (P)2000 Books on Tape, Inc. and HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Thrillers & Suspense Young Adult Fiction
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What the critics say

"John Lee conveys both Banks' intelligence and his uneasy depths in this fine performance, which far surpasses the print version as a reading experience." ( AudioFile)
"Goes much further than even The Remains of the Day in its examination of the roles we've had handed to us... His fullest achievement yet." ( The New York Times Book Review)
"With his characteristic finesse, Mr. Ishiguro infuses what seems like a classic adventure story with an ineffable tinge of strangeness." ( The Wall Street Journal)

What listeners say about When We Were Orphans

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Profile Image for DALEE. Planette

well written and nicely narrated

I stupidly hadn't realized this was a detective story, which is NOT my fav genre. However, I plodded thru it (thank goodness for the wonderful narration) and have finally finished it. Turns out to be more a story about a detective and much less about the mystery and its resolution and solving thereof.
The historical backdrop is quite interesting and not anything I knew about (early 20th C China/Shanghai, opium wars, China and Japan at war). But the story took forever to get going and mostly I was bored thru much of the novel. I wouldn't not recommend, but I'm unlikely to seek out the author again.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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Profile Image for j. campion

the best of the best

... an incredible tale by the masterful Ishiguro performed by a superb narrator. I was caught up in the narrative from the very first line to the last.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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Profile Image for andrew

Memory

Our minds work very differently as children, young adults and when we age. The first person narrator, Christopher Banks, has amazing powers of recall but his mind plays other tricks and distorts the past (was Akira really Akira?). Although I loved the story I couldn't warm to Banks or Sarah Hemmings. Banks treated some Chinese and Japanese appallingly and in a very colonialist way. Perhaps Ishiguro intends for his protagonist to be unpopular, as he was at his prep school. Strange that as a detective it took Banks so long to figure some things out but it was the start of WWII and then after that communist China so perhaps no surprise. Nothing is quite what it seems at first in this novel and that keeps one guessing. Is Banks even a reliable narrator? I suspect not. Many times he tells us his memory is foggy on a particular event only to then go on and paint a crystal clear account in cinematographic detail. He tells us endlessly and nauseatingly how he is a great detective without actually saying much about the cases.
John Lee was fine with the European voices and does pomposity very well but I really wish he hadn't put on faux Asian accents for the various Chinese and Japanese characters. This is Mr. I. Y. Yunioshi territory and I'm sure very offensive to South-East Asian listeners.

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Profile Image for Annie

Table of contents issue

The table of contents of the audible version is different from the one of printed/electronic book. This issue makes switching between this audiobook and a printed copy more difficult than it should be.

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    2 out of 5 stars
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Profile Image for Ricksilver

Not for me

I abandoned at the climax. Too much of nothing in so many ways. caveat emptor.

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