When We Were Orphans

Written by Kazuo Ishiguro

Narrated by John Lee

Narrated by John Lee

""John Lee conveys both Banks' intelligence and his uneasy depths in this fine performance."" —AudioFile

A masterful novel from Kazuo Ishiguro, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, author of the Booker Prize–winning novel The Remains of the Day, and one of the most admired writers of our time.

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 twenty 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 won't, 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.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Jun 21, 2005
• ISBN: 9780060854317

Kazuo Ishiguro

Kazuo Ishiguro nació en Nagasaki en 1954, pero se trasladó a Inglaterra en 1960. Es autor de ocho novelas –Pálida luz en las colinas (Premio Winifred Holtby), Un artista del mundo flotante (Premio Whitbread), Los restos del día (Premio Booker), Los inconsolables (Premio Cheltenham), Cuando fuimos huérfanos, Nunca me abandones (Premio Novela Europea Casino de Santiago), El gigante enterrado y Klara y el Sol– y un libro de relatos –Nocturnos–, obras extraordinarias que Anagrama ha publicado en castellano. En 2017 fue galardonado con el Premio Nobel de Literatura.

Reviews for When We Were Orphans

[laurensx · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Book review of “When We Were Orphans”submitted by Lauren Schexnider2-29-2012Kazuo Ishiguro is definitely a talented writer. I enjoyed the backdrop of a growing opium trade in Shanghai and other countries in the Orient, along with the growing political interference of other nations. Ishiguro fashioned an interesting novel, rich with imagery and choice words, truly evoking the romanticism of the 1920s and 1930s. His character development was deep and made for three dimensional characters which evoked emotional reactions from this reader. I also appreciated Ishiguro’s sense of the passing of time, accomplished through the maturation of the main characters, establishment of relationships and the aging of cities. Lastly, I enjoyed how each character found themselves in the situation of being an orphan, and how powerfully that essence of loneliness was woven throughout the text.While enjoying these elements of the author’s craft, I was bored by the book and found the plot to be quite predictable. Once Uncle Phillip was introduced and became so enmeshed with the family, I predicted he would have some involvement in the disappearance of Christopher’s parents. Also easily predictable was Sarah and her “grand” entrances into the text, as was the development of a “relationship” between Sarah and Christopher. While it was a long shot, I suspected Christopher would find his parents, or at least his mother, which he did. However, I was really saddened by the outcome of her “survival” under the abusive slavery of Wang Ku and the fact that she didn’t know Christopher when finally seeing him.Christopher was such a flat character, that I don’t know how others found him so appealing. He was a workaholic who was only part of the “in crowd”, due to his prowess as a detective. Otherwise, he came across a socially inept and unaware of how to begin and sustain a relationship with a woman. His obsession with Akira was unnatural, especially since there was some antagonism between the two boys during their childhood. The fact that any Japanese man looked like Akira, was a bit amusing to me.I completely hated Sarah. She was an absolute nuisance and utterly lacking in any personal depth of character. The only times Sarah was remotely human and spurred my compassion was when she and Christopher rode the bus through London, with Sarah reminiscing about her mother. The other time I felt sorry for Sarah was when Sir Cecil slapped her around in the casino - no woman deserves abuse. However, Sarah’s desperation to be connected with someone socially acceptable put her into the situation.Christopher’s mother seemed the only sense of morality throughout the text. She was steadfast in her determination to get her husband to admit his actions against the people of the Orient, as well as his extramarital affair. Her fierce love and protection of Christopher was evident, as she’d give him the eye when she was involved in business, but come outside to sing and play with him, once her work was completed. It almost makes me ill thinking about all she endured to protect the son she loved so much.Lastly, I found it interesting, but almost understandable that Christopher would adopt Jennifer. Here too, the orphan rears its head and is granted a home. While not playing a significant role, Jennifer’s actual presence in Christophe’s life, seemed to give him a sense of purpose and meaning.Book Score: 4

[MR · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Continued to listen to the book because of the time period and the culture of 1930's expatriate Shanghai--found the storyline a bit unsatisfying. Seems the author gets the reader interested and then leaves a lot of gaps.

[shanaqui_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I keep starting Ishiguro's books not being quite sure about them -- with people telling me that I won't like them for x and y reasons, or with trepidation born from the wide spread of reviews they get. But there's something about Ishiguro's measured, calm prose that always draws me in. It gives a similarity to all his narrators, but it usually works well with the character he chooses to narrate.

(You may consider the rest of this review spoilery, because while I don't reveal major plot twists, I do talk about the narrator in quite a bit of detail, which for me is the main point of reading this book. So proceed with caution!)

He is also so very good at the unreliable narrator. It surprises me a little that other reviewers saw no hints of Christopher's unreliability earlier in the story: several times someone recounts events that he also remembers which he doesn't contradict in public, but in private he insists it wasn't that way at all. He has excuses for it all, of course: he didn't want to upset the person he was speaking to, they must have constructed some elaborate fantasy because of their loneliness/need for contact... But the clues are all there.

The first half seems very sedate and boring compared to the second half: there is a mystery, but the tone of the narrator makes it difficult to see it as anything urgent. The second half seems to descend almost into absurdity in comparison -- suddenly Christopher comes to seem a lot more important, if everything he's saying is true, and yet there's something very childish about his mission.

Ultimately, Ishiguro is not, for example, Iain Banks, so the narration continues in the same sedate vein, and the end of the novel is almost tender. Apart from a couple of chapters in the second half of the book, this isn't a story where major things happen, and our narrator is not the key player he wants to believe he is.

I really enjoyed it, I have to say. I enjoy Ishiguro's skill with his narrators, and his style is just perfect to keep me reading. It was style more than plot that kept me reading this, that makes it worth it to me, but in this case, the style and the plot go hand in hand.

[kromestomes · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm not entirely sure what to make of this novel. On the surface, it deals with the recollections of an internationally famous detective, Christopher Banks, who lived as a young boy with his parents in the International Settlement of Shanghai between the wars.Although a renowned investigator, Banks has never been able to solve the biggest crime of his life: what happened to his parents, who disappeared from the Settlement when he was a child.In nestled flashbacks and hazy remembrances, we're told Banks' view of growing up and, when older, follow him as he continues to try to solve the case.It's obvious that the book is to some extent a meditation on memory and dreams, bearing strong echoes of Ishiguro's "The Unconsoled." Yet, there's also evidence, especially in the conclusion, the what is happening is "real." At least in the sense that what we're dealing with is Banks' perceptions of the real world as he grows up, both physically and mentally.And that real world is pretty horrible, as the finale includes a nightmare trip through the warrens of Shanghai during the middle of the Japanese invasion of 1937. It's here that Banks wonder if the cries of the dying, exemplified by the piteous moans of a mortally wounded soldier, are a necessary parallel to the cries of the newborn.I recommend this book pretty highly, although I stand by my opinion that the ending doesn't seem to match the rest of the book.

[William Broker · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a fascinating tale told with beautiful prose. Like all fine writing, the truth set forth thru fiction is so instructive.

[adrateia_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's fair to say now that I absolutely love Ishiguro. I've been quite busy so it was harder for me to get into it at the beginning, but once I did I was hooked. Fantastic (and at times, utterly depressing) story.

[ungoliant-2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's fair to say now that I absolutely love Ishiguro. I've been quite busy so it was harder for me to get into it at the beginning, but once I did I was hooked. Fantastic (and at times, utterly depressing) story.

[Melinda Ring · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Incomplete. Where is the rest of the book?

[Ibrahim Williams · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The author, the reader, what a pleasant equilibrium. I loved it.

[maxernst11 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Dit was echt een afknapper. Deze roman begint in een fantastisch vlotte, vertellende stijl die erg aan The Remains of the Day doet denken. De tijd van het gebeuren is net als in dat andere boek de jaren 1930, en de hoofdfiguur, Christopher Banks, heeft een al even gedateerd beroep als de butler Stevens, namelijk detective (of dat moeten we toch van hem aannemen). Plaats van het gebeuren is deels Londen, maar vooral het exotische Shanghai, vlak voor het door Japan werd ingenomen, redelijk exotisch dus en rechtstreeks verbonden met de wereldgeschiedenis. Maar daar eindigt mijn lofrede. Het hele boek lang stapelen zich namelijk ongerijmdheden op, dingen die onmiddellijk merkwaardig overkomen, maar waarvan je je afvraagt of ze misschien wel niet een functie hebben die pas in de loop van het verhaal uitgeklaard zal worden. Om er maar ??ntje te noemen: de succesvolle carri?re van Banks als detective; we moeten hem daarvoor op zijn woord geloven, want nergens krijgen we details over de manier waarop hij bepaalde ophefmakende zaken zouden hebben opgelost, en de manier waarop hij in het slot van het boek te werk gaat, getuigt van zulk een amateurisme dat je je ernstige vragen gaat stellen bij het waarheidsgehalte van zijn beweringen. OK, denk je dan, mogelijk is het Ishiguro daar net om te doen. Want net als in The Remains of the Day lijken we te doen te hebben met een hoofdfiguur die een pertinent misvormde kijk op de werkelijkheid heeft (het thema van de onbetrouwbare verteller dus ook) en daardoor voortdurend verkeerde inschattingen maakt en ook tal van kansen mist. Interessant, inderdaad, maar ik kan me niet van de indruk ontdoen dat Ishiguro dit thema onderweg zo karikaturaal behandeld, dat zijn hoofdfocus elders komt te liggen, namelijk bij ? weer eens net als in The Remains of the Day ? bij een oudere man die melancholisch terugkijkt op zijn leven, ditmaal getekend door het feit dat hij gehandicapt was omdat hij al jong niet meer op zijn ouders kon terugvallen. En dan moet ik duidelijk stellen: die eerdere roman was veel beter verteld, veel homogener, en veel ingetogener gebracht dan het bij wijlen surrealistische schouwspel dat we in When we were Orphans voorgeschoteld krijgen. Ik denk dat Ishiguro hier even het noorden kwijt was.

[valzi-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Good in the same way that all of his other books seem to be good, but not quite as good as his best.

[zappa_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Ishiguro has, at least in this novel, a slightly wooden style that narrates and tantalizes without captivating. The interiority of the narrator's perspective provides no real insight into the minds of the characters, even the narrator's own. Not a bad novel, but not one that grips the consciousness, either.

[JC lynch · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Ridiculous. 20 minutes left in the audio book and I’m not going to finish. Ridiculous plot. Ridiculous coincidences. Very little to redeem this book. Shocked at how awful it is considering who the author is

[vorobyey_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Told through recollection mixed with current action, I found this book well written, as expected of Ishiguro, but rather unsatisfying.
The protagonist sees himself as a Sherlock Holmesian type character for most of the book, living out the childhood detective games he played with his Japanese friend in the sheltered and protected foreign Settlement in Shanghai. It felt like he was acting out a role he had given himself, with little insight into either himself or those around him.
The aspect I appreciated most was the backdrop of and superficial insight into the Japanese incursions into China of the 1930s. This caused me to do some background reading into this period of history in this region.

[sriddell_8 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Christopher Banks grows up in Shanghai with his English parents in the early 20th century. After the death and/or disappearance of his parents, he returns to England and follows an extremely privileged path. Eventually becoming a famous detective.

He returns to Shanghai in 1937 in the midst of both the Japanese invasion of China and the Nationalist vs Communist civil war. With the beginnings of WWII just gearing up. He returns after becoming convinced his parents are still alive after all these years and he's going to "solve the case".

As a narrator, Christopher is shockingly unreliable. In fact, he's so un-self-aware and so clueless, I doubt that he's even a real detective. And aside from his triumphant return to Shanghai to solve the 20-year-old case surrounding his parents, we see no evidence of any actual detective work in the book.

I enjoyed the book but really disliked the protagonist. He was sympathetic as a young man, but completely intolerable as an adult.

And the second interlude in Shanghai is so odd it's almost surreal. At that point Christopher almost becomes a caricature of the ugly, entitled westerner running amok in China.

I've enjoyed other books from this author, but this wasn't his best.

[josephking6602 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

We are all orphans looking for our parents; remeniscence for past; two main characters are friends as orphan children; they meet again after 30 years; china/japan war;

[sblincoln-479351 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A beautifully written story of losing one's grip on reality. The audio version is very well narrated, which adds to the appeal of the books.

[reader1009-863136 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

audiobook fiction - classic literature/historical fiction - British national looks for missing parents in Shanghai (evolution of opium trade, second Sino-Japanese War in early 1940s); author was born in Nagasaki in 1951 but moved to GB at the age of 5.

I liked the gentle, quiet pace of the narration at first, but was somewhat disappointed by the story--readers that have settled into the first half are bound to be unsettled by the latter half, and readers that enjoy the second half are generally bored silly by the first half. Of course Christopher Banks (the unreliable narrator) is written to be pretty unlikeable, with his arrogant, self-centered actions throughout the last half of the book.

The main story is not in fact the mystery around his parents' disappearances but his clinging to his faulty memories of an idyllic childhood despite having been orphaned at a young age. The episode (several chapters long) about getting to the building where his parents had supposedly been kept prisoner for 18(?) years was frustrating (he said he would only be gone a few minutes)--mainly it served as a way for Christopher to reconnect with Akira (a Japanese soldier who has dishonored himself by spilling secrets to the Chinese) but mostly showed that he was actually a terrible detective, and how very deeply invested he was in believing his childhood to have been a happy one that he would make such a long series of extremely poor decisions in the hopes that he would turn out to be right.

[chazzifrazz · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Kazuo Ishiguro writes books that you don’t race through. You find yourself taking time to enjoy the characters and the settings along with the story line.

Christopher Banks is of English parentage, born and living in Shanghai in the beginning of the 1900s. At age nine he became an orphan when both parents mysteriously disappeared. He is sent to England to live with an aunt and finish his schooling.

Since his parents’ mysterious disappearance, Christopher has had the desire to search and solve the mystery. When he finishes school, he becomes a detective, a private consultant, and earns a reputation for his solving of difficult cases.

This is a memoir of when he returned to Shanghai in 1937 to find out what happened to his parents. It are his memories that serve as clues to what may have happened. There are flashbacks to his young years in Shanghai and Akira, his friend and early playmate. What he discovers is that there were things going on he had no knowledge of that were part of the disappearance.

He locates the house where he lived, thinking his parents may still be alive and held captive. Instead he finds that isn’t true and winds up being captured by Japanese soldiers. This takes place during the second Sino-Japanese war.

[ken5me5old5mate · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is 3.5 stars!!!! fuck you Goodreads and your fucked up whole stars only system!! Yes, fuck you for not having half stars!!! Bloody Muppets!

I was iffy about this one. Set in the period between the wars and written as if it was written during that period with all of its class ridden assumptions and mores. Not a favourite era for me, at least not in this stuffy English way.

The main character is superficial and annoying and his exploits are alluded to but seldom illustrated so you really don't know if this guy is good or just thinks he's good. Either way I felt little empathy for him.

The main female character could have been his mum or his love interest but either way it was another "not convincing" thing about this book that annoyed me.

The book is about many things: hubris, regret, nostalgia, confusion, and stupidity.

I have read enough of his books to know that he was writing in style but I just did not like it that much. Sorry

[Julieta Ax · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

So far, this is the best book I've read by Kazuo Ishiguro!

The book is not only easy and enjoyable to read, as is common in his works, but this particular one conveys that urgent need to know how the story will end. It never bores you, and every page is interesting.

I don't think I had read anything about Shanghai, so as the story takes place partly there and partly in London, the reading becomes very enriching.

What impresses me the most about Kazuo is his ability to create an incredible story without resorting to that common place in novels where everything turns out well, yet so far from what is supposed to be real in our daily lives.

I really missed finding a writer who inspires that desire to read all his novels, one after the other. That longing to never abandon his narrative voice in my ears.

I must start reading another of his novels today! (Translated from Spanish)

[urraca99 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The first part is more interesting: the detective of Asian origin and his complicated cases. With the return to China, the story becomes convoluted and unpredictable. (Translated from Spanish)

[37143birnbaum · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I love Ishiguro's writing. I am totally engrossed immediately after beginning one of his books. This one was no exception at the beginning, but I thought the second half of the book dragged. How he thought his parents could still be being held prisoner after 18 years is a bit of a stretch. Surely someone would have located them or they would have managed an escape--something. I did not like that he and Sarah almost got together. He was not even slightly attracted to her in all their meetings. I got the feeling that he found her slightly repugnant It felt like he was thinking, "Well, nobody else has come along...." She was such an opportunist. The Jennifer thing? The story seemed very disjointed. Christopher certainly had a lot on his plate--finding his parents, finding Akira, trying to be a successful, respected detective, raising an orphan, Jennifer, deciding where he wanted to live, England or Shanghai. It all hinged on finding the Yellow Snake and learning what he knew. And when Christopher finally did find him and the Yellow Snake told him everything, how much to believe. At least Christopher found Akira, and we could imagine what happened, and at least he found his mother, and we could imagine what happened there. He also found out about Sarah, so all loose ends were gathered together.

reader37143 7/6/21

[ionas_7 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the first book I’ve read by this author but I may read others at some point.



The story is somewhat convoluted and it was a bit hard for me to make head or tail of it, but it’s about an English boy called Christopher living in Shanghai with his parents.



Various characters flit in and out of his life including a girl he calls Miss Hemmings.



Ha has a Japanese childhood friend called Akira who later again comes to play a role in his life.



In Shanghai Christopher and his parents live in relative safety in the International Settlement while in the Chinese areas of the city there are all manner of ghastly diseases, filth and evil men.



Christopher’s beautiul mother worked to get rid of the high level of opium addiction in Shanghai. She has lunches attended by various ladies, and Christopher’s mysterious uncle Philip is always in attendance.



At one point Christopher’s parents both disappear, and it appears that Uncle Philip is somehow involved. Detectives are looking for the parents but to no avail.



Christopher becomes a famous detective and at one point late in the plot decides himself to search for his long-lost parents.



Finding a Chineseman called the Yellow Snake is apparently a key factor in finding C’s parents.



The book is elegantly written.

[starbox_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very typically Ishiguro writing- the polite, contained, repressed hero, Christopher Banks, is very much after the pattern of the butler in Remains of the Day.
Banks is an English detective- raised by an elderly aunt after the mysterious disappearance in his childhood of both parents in two unexplainced incidents in Shanghai.
And now, after years of research, Banks feels he is on to something and returns...
It starts brilliantly; the echoes back to his early life, a Japanese playmate, the relationship of his parents.
But as he returns with such unreasonable confidence in his success in the midst of the Sino-Japanese war (20+ years on)...it all started to feel quite surreal. The author does a very vivid job of portraying the horrors of war.
Like Ishiguro's other works, this hinges on memory, regret and failure in life, but it "grabbed" me less than some of his other works..

[tommi180744 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Excellent story told with insight and compassion for the very realistically envisaged characters.

[ainjel-3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There are 3 types of books in my opinion. There are plot novels. These are the books that are accessible to everyone and easy to read. You flip through page after page, the plot guiding everything. There are character novels. They are slower, but can be quick paced too. These books focus on characterization and character development within their pages. Then, there are literary novels. These are the novels that are hard to read, with stories that most claim they don't "get." They're often described as "boring" because the real action and art happens at the level of the words on a page.

When We Were Orphans is one of these literary books.

What happens can probably be summed up in a sentence or two. The plot is simple, and the story itself is easy to explain. But what this book is about is a much more difficult thing to articulate.

Memory. In one word, this is a story about memory, and how nothing is ever how we remember it to be. What is reality if my memory of the past is different from your own? Whose is the truth? What happens when we alter our memories to fit the story we wish we had?

Ah. Ah, you see? This is a beautiful book indeed.

Take your time. Read with patience. Enjoy the experience. Feel what the words bring you. Let your memory guide you.

[tkcs-3 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Ishiguro is brilliant at creating a sense of place--I can't think of anyone better. It's been a while since I read this book and just seeing the cover takes me right back to the scenes in post WW II London and the opium dens in Shanghai. I would give this a 3.5 if I could. I don't give out 4s and 5s lightly, so a three from me means I recommend it.

[Tina Glez · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This Nobel Prize-winning author uses simple language but at the same time with delightful prose, and in this novel, it is enjoyable from the very first page. Christopher Banks suffers the disappearance of his parents in Shanghai at a young age and returns to his native England to live with his aunt. His dreams of becoming a detective become a successful reality, which is how he decides to return to his past in Shanghai and search for his parents, putting aside other important aspects of his life to achieve this mysterious and significant mission. (Translated from Spanish)

[Tina8 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This Nobel Prize-winning author uses simple language but at the same time with delightful prose, and in this novel, it is enjoyable from the first page. Christopher Banks suffers the disappearance of his parents in Shanghai at a young age and returns to his native England to live with his aunt. His dreams of becoming a detective become a successful reality, which is how he decides to return to his past in Shanghai and search for his parents, putting aside other important aspects of his life to accomplish this mysterious and significant mission. (Translated from Spanish)