I greatly enjoyed reading When Broken Glass Floats because it was both heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time. This was the second book I've read that has made me cry because it was so sad. When Broken Glass Floats is about Chanrithy's childhood and how half of her family was killed because of the Khmer Rouge holocaust. The Khmer Rouge took over Cambodia and vacated all of the cities and forced everyone to live in huts. Anyone who opposed them was murdered and/or tortured. Chanrithy's family cooperated with the Khmer Rouge in hope of keeping their lives. Instead of shopping for groceries everybody was given food rations, though it was not enough to feed Chanrithy's family of nine. Over time the amount of food that was distributed dwindled, and many died of starvation. Throughout the book I kept on thinking that it couldn't get any worse for Chanrithy, but tragedies continued to occur.
I would recommend this book to high schoolers because it is so sad and brutal how all of these innocent people died trying to take care of their families and themselves. I know that if I had survived that like Chanrithy, I would never trust anyone again. Yet Chanrithy Him went to America and got her B.S. in biochemistry. Now she is working for the Khmer Adolescent Project and studies post-traumatic stress disorder among Cambodians that survived the Khmer Rouge holocaust.
This book was tragic and to think that Chanrithy was only nine when it began is just amazing, but sad because she spent all of her teenage years as a slave. She was forced to do work when she was ill and had a horribly infected foot. The Khmer Rouge had no hearts whatsoever because if they did they would not have been so cruel and brutal towards innocent civilians. I loved the book, but it just got too sad for me at times. That was part of the reason why I had recommended it to high schoolers; because I am a very mature reader but I emotionally almost couldn't handle this book. The Khmer Rouge were killing babies and pregnant women! The sorrows of this book were quite shocking.