When Broken Glass Floats

(Khmer Rouge)

When Broken Glass Floats

By: Chanrithy Him

** Two starts out of Five

Reviewed by Silvia

When Broken Glass Floats, by Chanrithy Him, was an extremely intense and sad book. This book is based on a true story. The author, Chanrithy Him, went through a lot in this book.

This book is about a girl named Chanrithy who lives in Cambodia in the time of war when Cambodia gets taken over by Khmer rouge. The Khmer Rouge was a terrorist organization that was made in Cambodia. Chanrithy’s family later gets affected by the Khmer Rouge. Her family then gets into a refugee camp. At the camp, many terrible and interesting things happen. Many deaths and depressing moments happen while they’re at the camp. Chanrithy’s family starts to loose hope after the hard life they lived.

I gave this book two stars because it was kind of boring to me. Yes, it was very sad, but I’ve just read and heard about this kind of issues many times. It’s the kind of issue where someone looses their family and someone gets stuck in a refugee camp in the time of war.There were some moments where the book was so intense that I got scared. But the book was the same most of the time. There were big changes in the book but not enough changes to me. The characters in the book were interesting. They were very descriptive and interesting people. My favorite character was Mak. She was Chanrithy’s mother. I liked her the best because she was very caring. She also had very interesting things to say. She cared a lot for Chanrithy and Chanrithy’s siblings. (Mak’s other children). One of the things I liked the most about the author and the characters were how descriptive the author and characters were. The writing style in this book was very good. They had very good metaphors. The author had very good writing styles. That was one thing I really liked about the book. Also, even though the book wasn’t that interesting, I didn’t dislike any of the characters.

I would recommend this book to ages fourteen and up. This book is really heavy for young children. It’s very sad and I don’t think children under fourteen should be that informed by periods of time that have to do with war. Middle aged people and also adults should read this book because I think they would find this book interesting but sad. It’s the right kind of book for people that age.

All in all, this book was a little boring, but sad. It sends a message saying care for your family and be aware of war. Everyone should be informed about war and issues like that. If you like sad and intense books, then this book is for you!