Tatjana Soli's The Lotus Eaters is a really marvelous novel--both lush and beautiful but also brutal and heart-wrenching. As much as I got caught up in the story and wanted to keep reading, I found I could only mange it in small doses. The story follows a young American woman who travels to Vietnam in 1963 to work as a photojournalist and gets so caught up in the war she remains until the bitter end.
I've read very little about the Vietnam War save Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, but I always have this expectation that reading about it will be so uncomfortable that it will be too disturbing to stick it out. Unlike reading about wars from the distant past, this one is almost just within grasp of (my) living memory, which somehow makes it harder read about. However, with two novels now under my belt I am curious to read and learn more. Although there are some distressing scenes in The Lotus Eaters, by and large there is nothing overly graphic in it. What made it slow going for me was that it was so often emotionally draining--not only just reading about a war and its effects on the soldiers and Vietnamese population but also about the inner turmoil that Helen Adams suffers throughout the course of the story.
The novel opens at the end of the war during the fall of Saigon in 1975 as the Americans are pulling out of the country. The city is in total disarray and there is a lawless mentality amongst the people, so many of whom are trying to get out before the Communists finally take over. It's obvious that Helen is war weary yet she is also obsessed with getting those final photographs of the handover as well as being the last American woman reporter in Vietnam. She no longer fears death, as the war has taken that away from her. What she fears is the possibility of failure. Her entire world has become the war and Vietnam, she believes she knows nothing else and has nothing else to go home to.
Moving back in time to 1963 and the beginning of the story--or at least Helen's beginning--the reader sees what steps led to that moment. Helen arrives in Saigon with much optimism and naivety and practically no experience. She's driven to go to the war to understand what happened to her brother who died in Vietnam, even dropping out of college as she thought it would be over before she had a chance to make her mark. She has little knowledge of what makes a good photo and her first foray into combat is a disaster. She's befriended, though perhaps seduced is a better word, by Sam Darrow who has made a name for himself through his famous photos. They embark on a passionate affair that becomes as all-consuming for them both as is their desire to photograph the war.
Over time, and Helen remains in the country for the duration, she becomes a seasoned photojournalist and perhaps something of a novelty for being one of the few (the only in this story) women reporters in Vietnam. Not just satisfied with going out on the approved, and mostly safe, press junkets she seeks out the more dangerous combat missions, which help her earn her a fierce reputation. Jaded by years in the field (jokingly he says the cool thing is that there is always another war around the corner) Sam is ambivalent about his work yet he cannot pull himself away from it. He sends his assistant, Linh, a former soldier-turned photographer to help Helen and look out for her, creating a complicated love triangle. For all three the war is not only their making but their undoing as well.
I wondered as I read the story about what motivates a photojournalist to put him/herself into the most dangerous situations in order to record these world events. For Helen and Sam there was an adrenaline rush feeling of getting just the perfect shot that would make the cover of a magazine or win a Pulitzer, though I think there has to be something more to it as well. It seems such a fine line to walk between documenting such suffering and exploiting it. At what point does idealism turn into something darker.
I thought Soli did a good job not only asking these questions but balancing them, as well showing how destructive is war (no matter with what initial good intentions) and how it leads to corruption but at the same time not passing judgment either. This was an intensely visual book and it had an almost cinematic quality to it. I can almost imagine it being made into a movie as Soli's descriptions were so vivid. Although not without a few flaws, I was very impressed by the story.
The Lotus Eaters was last month's Literature and War Readalong selection. You can read Caroline's thoughts here and follow the discussion in the comments area. More reviews are at Diary of an Eccentric and Savvy Verse & Wit. Next up is The Silent Angel by Heinrich Böll.