First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers (P.S.)
by Loung Ung
from Harper Perennial
Written in the present tense, First They Killed My Father will put you right in the midst of the action--action you'll wish had never happened. It's a tough read, but definitely a worthwhile one, and the author's personality and strength shine through on every page. Covering the years from 1975 to 1979, the story moves from the deaths of multiple family members to the forced separation of the survivors, leading ultimately to the reuniting of much of the family, followed by marriages and immigrations. The brutality seems unending--beatings, starvation, attempted rape, mental cruelty--and yet the narrator (a young girl) never stops fighting for escape and survival. Sad and courageous, her life and the lives of her young siblings provide quite a powerful example of how war can so deeply affect children--especially a war in which they are trained to be an integral part of the armed forces. For anyone interested in Cambodia's recent history, this book shares a valuable personal view of events. --Jill Lightner
One of seven children of a high-ranking government official, Loung Ung lived a privileged life in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh until the age of five. Then, in April 1975, Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge army stormed into the city, forcing Ung's family to flee and, eventually, to disperse. Loung was trained as a child soldier in a work camp for orphans, her siblings were sent to labor camps, and those who survived the horrors would not be reunited until the Khmer Rouge was destroyed.
Harrowing yet hopeful, Loung's powerful story is an unforgettable account of a family shaken and shattered, yet miraculously sustained by courage and love in the face of unspeakable brutality.
When Broken Glass Floats: Growing Up Under the Khmer Rouge
by Chanrithy Him
from W. W. Norton & Company
"Chea, how come good doesn't win over evil?" young Chanrithy Him asks her sister, after the brutal Khmer Rouge have seized power in Cambodia, but before hunger makes them too weak for philosophy. Chea answers only with a proverb: When good and evil are thrown together into the river of life, first the klok or squash (representing good) will sink, and the armbaeg or broken glass (representing evil) will float. But the broken glass, Chea assures her, never floats for long: "When good appears to lose, it is an opportunity for one to be patient, and become like God."
Before this proverb could come true, Chanrithy had to watch her mother, father, and five of her brothers and sisters die, murdered by the Khmer Rouge or fatally weakened by malnutrition, disease, and overwork. Now living in Oregon, where she studies posttraumatic stress disorder among Cambodian survivors, Chanrithy has written a first-person account of the killing fields that's remarkable for both its unflinching honesty and its refusal to despair. In wrenchingly immediate prose, she describes atrocities the rest of the world might prefer to ignore: her sick yet still breathing mother, thrown along with corpses into a well; a pregnant woman beaten to death with a spade, the baby struggling inside her; a sister impossibly swollen with edema, her starving body leaking fluid from the webbing between her toes.
The mind retreats from horrors like these--and yet what emerges most strongly from this memoir is the triumph of life. Chanrithy is determined to honor her pledge to the dying Chea, to study medicine so she can help others live. When Broken Glass Floats accomplishes the same goal in a different way. "As a survivor, I want to be worthy of the suffering that I endured," Chanrithy writes; by giving such eloquent voice to her dead, she has proven herself more than worthy of her suffering--and theirs. --Chloe Byrne
In this mesmerizing story, finalist for the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize, Chanrithy Him vividly recounts her trek through the hell of the "killing fields." She gives us a child's-eye view of a Cambodia where rudimentary labor camps for both adults and children are the norm and modern technology no longer exists. Death becomes a companion in the camps, along with illness. Yet through the terror, the members of Chanrithy's family remain loyal to one another, and she and her siblings who survive will find redeemed lives in America. 15 b/w photographs.
Angkor: Cambodia's Wondrous Khmer Temples, Fifth Edition (Odyssey Illustrated Guide)
by Dawn Rooney
from Odyssey
The great legacy of the ancient Khmer civilization, the temples of Angkor were built between the ninth and 15th centuries and cover an area stretching across 77 square miles in northwest Cambodia. This beautifully illustrated book contains a comprehensive monument-by-monument guide to the sites, detailed maps and plans, plus information about ten newly accessible temple complexes.
• Ten new temple sites; an additional 180 pages with 86 new color images
• Foreword by His Majesty King Norodom Sihamoni of Cambodia
• Extensive accounts of temples and pre-Angkor sites
• Profiles the Phnom Penh National Museum
• The hip town Siem Reap—the base for exploring Angkor
• Unique flora and fauna around the great lake, Tonle Sap
• 158 color photos, 44 maps & plans.
The Lost Executioner: A Story of the Khmer Rouge
by Nic Dunlop
from Walker & Company
A History of Cambodia
by David Chandler
from Westview Press
Terrify No More: Young Girls Held Captive and the Daring Undercover Operation to Win Their Freedom
by Gary A. Haugen
from Thomas Nelson
In a small village outside of Phnom Pehn, little children as young as five years old were forced to live as sex slaves. Day after day their hope was slipping away. Tireless workers from International Justice Mission (IJM) infiltrated the ring of brothels and gathered evidence to free the children. Headed up by former war-crimes investigator Gary Haugen, IJM faced impossible odds-police corruption, death threats, and mission-thwarting tip-offs. But they used their expert legal finesse and high-tech investigative techniques to save the lives of 37 young girls and secured the arrest and conviction of several perpetrators. Terrify No More focuses on this dramatic rescue story, and uses flashbacks to tell those of many other victims who were given a second chance at life by this amazing organization.
Readers of John Grisham and Ted Dekker novels will appreciate the suspense, plot twists, and relentless pursuit of justice found in the true story of Terrify No More.
Angkor and the Khmer Civilization (Ancient Peoples and Places)
by Michael D. Coe
from Thames & Hudson
The ancient city of Angkor has fascinated Westerners since its rediscovery in the mid-nineteenth century. A great deal is now known about the brilliant Khmer civilization that flourished among the monsoon forests and rice paddies of mainland Southeast Asia, thanks to the pioneering work of French scholars and the application of modern archaeological techniques such as remote sensing from the space shuttle.
The classic-period Khmer kings ruled over their part-Hindu and part-Buddhist empire from AD 802 for more than five centuries. This period saw the construction of many architectural masterpieces, including the huge capital city of Angkor, with the awe-inspiring Angkor Wat, the world's largest religious structure. Numerous other provincial centers, bound together by an impressive imperial road system, were scattered across the Cambodian Plain, northeast Thailand, southern Laos, and the Delta of southern Vietnam. Khmer civilization by no means disappeared with the gradual abandonment of Angkor that began in the fourteenth century, and the book's final chapter describes the conversion of the Khmer to a different kind of Buddhism, the move of the capital downriver to the Phnom Penh area, and the reorientation of the Khmer state to maritime trade.
Angkor and the Khmer Civilization presents a concise but complete picture of Khmer cultural history from the Stone Age until the establishment of the French Protectorate in 1863, and is lavishly illustrated with maps, plans, drawings, and photographs. Drawing on the latest archaeological research, Michael D. Coe brings to life Angkor's extraordinary society and culture. 130 illustrations, 22 in color.
Never Again, Again, Again...: Genocide: Armenia, The Holocaust, Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, Darfur
by Lane H. Montgomery
from Ruder Finn Press, Inc.
A powerful photographic essay with text on the six major genocides of the 20th and 21st centuries: Armenia, the Holocaust, Cambodia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Rwanda and Darfur. More than a chronicle of dates and death tolls, it gives a personal history of victims, perpetrators and consequences. With texts by Terry George, Dr. Richard Hovannisian, Amb. James Rosenthal, et. al.
When The War Was Over: Cambodia And The Khmer Rouge Revolution, Revised Edition
by Elizabeth Becker
from PublicAffairs
Elizabeth Becker's When the War Was Over: Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge Revolution is a heart-rending history of modern Cambodia--a state whose people have, in the last 30 years, endured war, political upheaval, international betrayal, and genocide. Beginning with the Khmer Rouge overthrow of the U.S.-backed Lon Nol regime in 1975, Becker examines the historical patterns of violence and authority within Cambodian culture that made the Khmer Rouge's slaughter of close to 2 million people possible.
Becker integrates interviews with Cambodian leaders and ordinary citizens with a penetrating analysis of the politics of the cold war and humanitarianism. For example, she follows the story of Mey Komphot, a banker, who, like millions of others, was displaced from his life in Phnom Penh and marched to a labor camp. She also explores how the United States, as well as many states within the United Nations, refused to acknowledge the forced departures and the killing in order to appease China's hunger for punishing Vietnam's 1978 invasion of Cambodia. By contrasting the concerns of states with those of people, Becker shows how the international order has repeatedly betrayed the people of Cambodia. When the War Was Over is more than just an authoritative account of the Cambodian Revolution; Becker's trenchant portrait of the dynamics of power and human suffering serves as a warning about how diplomatic imperatives can blunt the United Nations' ability to preserve human rights and life. --James Highfill
Killing Fields, Living Fields
by Don Cormack
from Monarch Books
(Foreword by Peter Lewis) "This heart-wrenching, heartwarming narrative prompts tears, prayers, praise, and hopes in turn. It is a long time since I read anything so poignant." --J. I. Packer (20040603)
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