First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers Background

“From 1975 to 1979 - through execution, starvation, disease and forced labour - the Khmer Rouge systematically killed an estimated two million Cambodians, almost a fourth of the country’s population.” From Author’s Note in First They Killed My Father

First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers is a non-fiction, autobiographical account of the Khmer Rouge years written by Loung Ung.

Living in a middle-class family in Phnom Penh, five-year-old Loung Ung’s life is turned upside down when the Khmer Rouge take power and evacuate the city. For the next 5 years, Ung and her family flee from village to village trying to hide their education and previous lives of privilege. Ung is separated from her family and trained as a child soldier until finally reunited with the remainder of her family towards the end of the Khmer Rouge’s reign of terror.

Ung also relates her escape to the USA with her brother and sister-in-law where she struggles to reconcile her tragic and turbulent past with her relatively affluent present and her Cambodian heritage with her new life in America. Ung's book was well-received by critics and has been adapted as a 2017 Netflix film directed by Angelina Jolie.