Scan barcode
jess_mango's review against another edition
4.0
Initial rating: 3.5 stars. Subject to change. Further thoughts coming soon.
jouljet's review
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Genocide, War, Body horror, and Child death
helendeu's review
2.0
I just couldn't get in to this one. I like Pung's style normally but this felt too remote and it just didn't grab me.
theconstantreader's review against another edition
3.0
To begin with I really enjoyed this book, both the Beijing & Melbourne parts were really interesting to me & flowed naturally.
To be clear the way Pung writes has a natural fluidity to it, it's soft & gentle but constantly pulls you along in the intended direction.
Sadly I didn't enjoy the Cambodia parts as much. I actually feel bad for saying this given their content. I can't even fathom what these people went through & I am in no way trying to take anything away from that. However the prose became a little tiresome. It got a little repetitive & due to it being told in the first person, it just didn't have the same personal intricacies woven through that could have made me as a reader more attached to the story.
Overall it was a good read but just didn't hit all spots. I'd still like to read some of Pung's other work due to her style of writing, I just think I'd prefer a different subject matter.
To be clear the way Pung writes has a natural fluidity to it, it's soft & gentle but constantly pulls you along in the intended direction.
Sadly I didn't enjoy the Cambodia parts as much. I actually feel bad for saying this given their content. I can't even fathom what these people went through & I am in no way trying to take anything away from that. However the prose became a little tiresome. It got a little repetitive & due to it being told in the first person, it just didn't have the same personal intricacies woven through that could have made me as a reader more attached to the story.
Overall it was a good read but just didn't hit all spots. I'd still like to read some of Pung's other work due to her style of writing, I just think I'd prefer a different subject matter.
tlaynejones's review
challenging
emotional
funny
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
5.0
This was such an excellent memoir. It’s told in a third person pov, and the perspective alternates between the author and her father. To me this reads like a cross between raw, spare, intimate and sharp literary fiction, and the epic, gut wrenching truth of some historical fiction novels. Highly recommended.
Content Warnings
Graphic: War, Grief, Physical abuse, Murder, Excrement, Genocide, Medical trauma, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child death, Death, Violence, Slavery, and Classism