Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Adam Fifield
A Blessing Over Ashes
. The author's candid
account of growing up in 1980s America with Soeuth, his
adopted Cambodian brother, seen from both sides of the
cultural gap. Especially touching is the visit to Cambodia,
where Soeuth discovers that his Khmer family is still alive.
Bree Lafreniere
Music through the Dark
. Musician Daran
Kravanh only survived imprisonment by the Khmer Rouge
because the cadre took a liking to his music, often calling
him to play his accordion after a day toiling in the fields.
Harish C. Mehta and Julie B. Mehta
Hun Sen,
Strongman of Cambodia
. Based on interviews with Hun Sen
himself, his family and colleagues, this provides a frank
portrait of the man, though the authors have undoubtedly
chosen their words carefully.
Vann Nath
A Cambodian Prison Portrait: One Year in the
Khmer Rouge's S-21
. A survivor's account of Toul Sleng;
Nath, a trained artist, has since used his skills to create a
pictorial document of the appalling practices once visited
on inmates in the Toul Sleng Genocide Museum.
Haing S. Ngor and Roger Warner
Survival in the Killing
Fields
. Harrowing account by a doctor who survived torture
by the Khmer Rouge, but was unable to save his wife, who
died in childbirth. Fleeing Cambodia, the author eventually
reached America, where he won an Oscar for his role as Dith
Pran in the film
The Killing Fields
. He was murdered in 1996
by muggers, eight years after this topic was written.
Milton Osborne
Sihanouk, Prince of Light, Prince of
Darkness
. No-nonsense behind-the-scenes look at the
contradictory King-Father. He comes across as a likeable,
all-too-human
character,
if
often
petulant
and
egotistical.
★
U Sam Oeur
Crossing Three Wildernesses
. Poet, scholar,
engineer and politician, Oeur not only recounts his
enthralling life story in this memoir, but also packs it with
details of everyday Cambodian life, historic fact and
political intrigue.
Philip Short
Pol Pot: The History of a Nightmare
. Drawing
on such first-hand accounts as there are for an in-depth
analysis of Pol Pot and the circumstances that allowed the
Khmer Rouge to come to power.
★
Loung Ung
First They Killed My Father
. The author
pulls no punches in this heart-rending personal narrative of
the destruction of her family under the Khmer Rouge.
A sequel,
After They Killed Our Father: A Refugee from the
Killing Fields Reunites
with the Sister She Left Behind
completes the story.
