Customer Reviews

Journey to America #3 (DIGEST): Chantrea's Voyage

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Cambodia in 1975 is a war-torn country engulfed by a violent civil war. Thirteen-year-old Chantrea lives in the city of Phnom Pehn with her American father, who is a photographer, and her Cambodian mother. When her father goes away on an assignment, Chantrea and her mother expect to see him again in a few days. But the war ends suddenly when the cruel communist regime of the Khmer Rouge takes control. Chantrea's mother is killed, and Chantrea and her grandparents are forced out of their homes and into a work camp. They escape across the border to Thailand, where they live as refugees. Chantrea waits for news of her father and hopes for the opportunity to travel to America to live with her father's family there. When that opportunity comes, she takes it - but will she ever see her father again? This novel brought the terror of the not-so-distant past of 1975 in Cambodia to life. Chantrea was a strong, courageous heroine. If you enjoyed the first two books in the Journey to America series, you will like this one as well.

We were looking for novels for our kids ages 10 and 12 to read in preparation for a trip to Cambodia. Indeed, as another reviewer commented, no one in Cambodia wears the kinds of hats pictured on the front except Korean tourists just coming from Vietnam. The premise, that the heroine's father is American and can bail her out of anything that the Pol Pot regime can set up, I felt was somewhat insulting to the hundreds of thousands of Cambodians who suffered and those who survived. I suppose it was meant to help make the character more "accessible" to American readers, but it just seemed preposterous. The writing is universally bad, very awkward in places.

If you want an emotionally true novel with more accurate portrayals of life under the regime and a more realistic transition to the US, then try Mingfong Ho's Stone Goddess - much better written, and much more helpful if you wanted to understand what it's like to live in Cambodia. Especially if you're planning to visit the country, read Stone Goddess instead.

I personal did not had a chance to read this book, but by looking at the front cover. It was an inaccurate Front cover Picture and Background. The cover is more like in Saigon or somewhere in Vietnam. Cambodia and Cabodians never!!! wear head gear as the Vietnames did.