Comrade Sao

'Thursday 17 April 1975 is the day that I will never forget until the day I die. That was the day the Khmer Rouge took over Phnom Penh and overthrew the government of General Lon Nol and his Republican Party...'Thus begins Firos Iseu s gripping memoir of his experiences during the Khmer Rouge s brutal regime in Cambodia between April 1975 and January 1979. At the tender age of 12, Iseu whose revolutionary name , Comrade Sao, provides the book with its title faced the horrors of the regime s first wave of killings, which at a stroke deprived him of his parents and elder siblings. Bearing a diverse heritage of Indian, Laotian, and Vietnamese roots, he was branded a 17 April or new person, marking him as an outsider and second-class citizen. Comrade Sao stands as a testament to the resilience of the human spirit, showcasing the author s remarkable courage and resourcefulness in the face of terrifying adversity. This harrowing, unflinching and above all honest narrative sheds a necessary light on one of the darkest chapters of humanity of the past 50 years.