The best books that illuminate the Cambodian experience

Elizabeth Becker’s sweeping account of Pol Pot’s genocidal regime was essential reading for me as I struggled to understand what befell Cambodia in the 1970s-90s. A foreign correspondent in Cambodia starting in 1973, Becker witnessed some of Cambodia’s disasters firsthand and interviewed scores of survivors and perpetrators, including Pol Pot himself, at great personal risk.

This book adds vital context from the French colonial era, Pol Pot’s political education in Paris, U.S. bombing campaigns, and Lon Nol’s 1970 coup before “Pol Pot Time” (as Cambodians call the Khmer Rouge era) to the aftermath: Vietnam’s invasion and occupation, refugee camps and refugee policy in the West, the peace process, and Cambodia’s first postwar elections. I turned to Becker’s book again and again to put Chantha’s memories into historical context and (occasionally) inform our explanatory footnotes.

Loung Ung’s harrowing memoir was the first of many Khmer Rouge survivor accounts I read, and it’s perhaps the most widely read KR memoir; it’s also been adapted by Angelina Jolie and Netflix into a stunning feature film.

Ung’s writing is simple and lyrical, and she captures her own childhood voice to heartbreaking effect as she recalls her family’s destruction at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, who seized power when she was five years old.

Ung has an astonishing ability to find humanity and hope amidst the worst horrors imaginable—a trait that Chantha shares and expresses in her sumptuous cooking, her nonprofit work with rural Cambodian women, and her dogged pursuit of a beautiful life. 

I loved Vaddey Ratner’s debut novel, which offers another heart-wrenching child’s-eye view of life under the Khmer Rouge. Raami, her seven-year-old protagonist, is marched out of Phnom Penh in April 1975 with her family, who is of royal stock and, therefore, in extreme peril.

Raami details the horror and cruelty she endures as the regime becomes ever more paranoid and murderous. She fights to retain vestiges of her earlier self, recalling her favorite myths and tales from Cambodian folklore—in this, I saw a parallel with how Chantha turns to her food memories and recipes to remember who she was before the disasters began. Ratner, a Khmer Rouge survivor, writes beautifully of endurance, survival, and hope amidst horror, and like Ung, she’s an important voice for Cambodian survivors, the conscience of a generation. 

I’m a huge admirer of the late Cambodian American author Anthony Veasna So—he had an eye for the perfect, defining detail. In his debut short-story collection, published after his death, he bore witness to his beloved Khmer diaspora community’s loves and losses, traumas and triumphs—somehow balancing bitter wit and humanity as he tackled the Big Questions: How do you remake a life after witnessing the worst horrors imaginable? How can the next generation truly understand what their elders endured?

So was an extraordinary talent—what a tragedy that he died so young. Thankfully, he left the world this splendid document of his generation’s experience of growing up as exiles in the shadow of genocide. Reading these stories as Chantha and I worked on her memoir helped us connect the parallel threads of what it was like for those who left Cambodia in the 1970s and made new lives abroad and for those who returned and built a life back home. 

To understand Cambodia, I needed to taste its flavors. Nhum (which means “eat” in Khmer) was a great way for me to learn more about Khmer cuisine between trips to Cambodia. Nhum is a beautifully designed cookbook—and it’s a historical document meant to help preserve Cambodian foodways, which were nearly wiped out by the Khmer Rouge’s campaign of murder, starvation, and cultural erasure.

Rotanak—known as “Chef Nak” to her fans—has become a celebrity in Cambodia, with two Cambodian cookbooks, a homestay/cooking lesson business in Phnom Penh, and a social media video series featuring her traveling the countryside, asking elders to share their recipes. The “Ingredients” section alone is a masterclass on what you’ll find in Cambodian gardens, pantries, and kitchens and how and why to use it.

Chantha and I met and cooked with Chef Nak a few years ago, and we admire her work preserving traditional recipes. I hope Chantha’s and Nak’s advocacy will help others fall in love with Khmer cuisine the way I have.