books:

	• When Broken Glass Floats: Growing Up Under the Khmer Rouge Chanrithy Him W. W. Norton & Company, 2000 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 44 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

My reaction throughout this book was that if I was God, I wouldn't send the perpetrators of this to Hell, because I wouldn't trust the devil to do a good enough job torturing them.

This book is a must read. The Killing Fields of Cambodia is often overlooked, but should be on the forefront of the lessons of history never to be forgotten. Get it, read it, and force your children to read it. Never forget.

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In Tragedy, There Is Hope

When she hears the news of the death of yet another family member, young Chanrithy writes, "Death is a constant, and we've become numb to the shock of it. People die here and there, all around us, falling like flies that have been sprayed with poison." Such was life under the Khmer Rouge. Chanrithy Him was only four years old when war came to Cambodia, first in the form of troops fleeing from neighboring Vietnam, and then the more deadly Khmer Rouge. Educated professionals were summarily executed, entire cities were evacuated under threat of death, and children such as Chanrithy were forced to work in inhumane conditions. An entire culture was virtually destroyed, but Him still manages to maintain an amazing degree of innocence and positivity. This is a powerful book about a tragic period in world history.

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More than a testimony...

When Broken Glass Floats is the true story of the tragic demise of a Cambodian family told through the eyes of an adolescent girl coming to age under the infamous Khmer Rouge regime. Immediately I was drawn into Chanrithy Him's ability to create a brief version of normalcy before the Khmer Rouge took over. How quickly the reader is transported from the stable love of a family into a place one could call hell. This is a story of a girl who's day to day struggle is to stay alive. And yet imbedded in the everyday battery that Chan writes about, are full fledged stories about discovering the sweet taste of grass, learning how to catch fish while simultaneously outsmarting slave drivers, and befriending a girl who's courage makes way for an escape. Chan endures illness and watches members of her family murdered, worked and starved to death. The narrator is both a heroine and a girl with wisdom that becomes a cornerstone in her survival. Chanrithy Him is a very fine writer. Her ability to conclude this book of unthinkable brutality with chronicles of a family run-post-war waffle stand, a personal yearning to learn English and a new found passion to live, demonstrate enormous grace we can all learn from.

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