First published 2012
Raami is seven when her father comes home at dawn with news that civil war has reached Phnom Penh. Their family enjoys royal privilege in Cambodia's capital, but revolution sweeps away their protected world. Soldiers force them from their home into the countryside. Over four years, Raami watches family members die from starvation and violence. She endures brutal forced labor under a regime that treats memory itself as a crime punishable by death. Her father once told her mythical legends and poems, and now these stories become her lifeline. In a world where remembering the past can mean execution, Raami holds onto these tales as her only connection to childhood. The stories help her survive when survival seems impossible. Ratner shows how narrative can sustain the human spirit even in the face of systematic destruction.
Genres: literary-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, 21st-century, asian-american
Vibes: emotional, intimate, lyrical, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Cambodia, Phnom Penh
Period: 1970s
322 pages · Hardcover · Simon & Schuster
Content warnings: death, violence