Crossing Three Wildernesses
U Sam Oeur
with Ken McCullough
Preface by David Chandler

Celebrated poet U Sam Oeur delivers a breathtaking and haunting portrait of Cambodia from his near-idyllic boyhood, to his years as a government official, to the devastating takeover of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, and the subsequent "liberation" of Cambodia by the Vietnamese. Having been educated in the United States and a proponent of democracy, Oeur was forced to feign illiteracy in order to survive the killing fields and their aftermath. A witness personally touched by the three wildernesses——death by execution, death by disease, and death by starvation—Oeur emerged from the experience with his hope for peace, freedom, and the power of literature unshaken. This remarkable memoir is a testament to the horrors of genocide and the strength of the human spirit.

Also Available by this Author:

• Sacred Vows