Oyungerel Tsedevdamba
Shadow of the Red Star, 2009 Longlist
Oyungerel Tsedevamba was born in Mongolia’s Khuvsgul Province close to the border with Siberian Russia. In 2004 she became the first Mongolian to graduate from Stanford University, where she received a Masters degree in International Policy Studies. She was selected a Yale University World Fellow in 2006. Oyungerel is a human rights activist and has served as Adviser to the Prime Minister and the President of Mongolia. At www.oyungerel.org/gel.html you can read about the writing of the Green Eyed Lama (co-authored by Oyungerel Tsedevamba & Jeffrey L. Falt).
Shadow of the Red Star (Green Eyed Lama) is set in 1938 the newly-installed, Communist Government of Mongolia, under orders from Moscow, launches a nation-wide purge murdering nearly a tenth of the country’s population and pitting a virulent twentieth century ideology against a millennia old nomadic culture. Sendmaa, a young herdswoman, falls in love with Baasan, a talented and handsome lama. However, before Baasan can leave the priesthood and marry Sendmaa, her scheming neighbor persuades Baasan’s brother, Bold, to “ask a bride” first. As the country teeters toward war, Baasan is sentenced to death as a class enemy, but an improbable ally, a lama turned “KGB” agent, intervenes. Nevertheless, Baasan must summon every bit of his talent and ingenuity to survive the gulag, reunite with Sendmaa, and help save the Buddhist faith.
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