I picked up this book at Books-A-Million for $5 while we were on vacation last week.  I wasn't able to put it down!  This is the story of a 7 year old little girl during the Communist Revolution in Cambodia in 1975.  Her family is royal - elite - until the Organization takes over and everything changes.  She and her family are shipped from one work camp to another, each one getting more barbaric and further and further away from the life they once led.  She faces the deaths of her family members, executions of total strangers, starvation.  She is repeatedly stripped of people and things that she loves but manages to stay alive, remembering her father's stories and plans for her life.

Early in the book, Raami's aunt says, "The problem with being seven - I remember myself at that age - is that you're aware of so much, and yet you understand so little. So you imagine the worst."  In Raami's case, unfortunately, she understands the hunger, death, destruction, and chaos around her and it is the worst.  She doesn't understand the Revolution or the Organization, but even many adults did not know what was going on.  But even still, she has the will to fight to live.

This story parallels the author's own experience in Cambodia as a child.  She did make small changes and combine her own family members to create characters in the book, but in essence, this is her story.  It hooks you, tugs at your heart, and makes you want to scoop Raami out of the horror she finds herself in.  Like I said, I have not been able to put it down!  It was a fabulous read and I definitely recommend it!

“The problem with being seven—I remember myself at that age—is that you’re aware of so much, and yet you understand so little. So you imagine the worst.” - See more at: http://books.simonandschuster.com/In-the-Shadow-of-the-Banyan/Vaddey-Ratner/9781451657715/reading_group_guide#sthash.cK6jYpNj.dpuf

“The problem with being seven—I remember myself at that age—is that you’re aware of so much, and yet you understand so little. So you imagine the worst.” - See more at: http://books.simonandschuster.com/In-the-Shadow-of-the-Banyan/Vaddey-Ratner/9781451657715/reading_group_guide#sthash.cK6jYpNj.dpuf