This book was fabulous. I've read the original of this book, and this version gets all the emotion and experience at Cambodia's dump without the graphic scenes that would make it inappropriate for a younger audience. I am a huge fan of kids understanding life outside their normal realm and this definitely supports that aim. I was curious and researched to find that this is still happening in Phnom Penh today.

Sang Ly lives at the dump with her husband and son. They live day-to-day with what they can pick and sell at the dump. But it is dangerous, smelly work. On top of it, Sang Ly's son is very ill and medicine is not cheap. When an unlikely friendship happens with the grumpy Rent Collector, the joy of words and books become the escape many at the dump need to keep living.

Again- I am so excited about this version of the story and cannot wait to share it with my children. I feel I could have my middle school kids and older read this, with the understanding that they should come ask me any questions they might have.

Thanks to NetGalley and Shadow Mountain for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Powerful, life-changing story

Is there anything dirtier or smellier than a garbage dump? Can you imagine living at the largest garbage dump in Cambodia? This is the difficult circumstance many people are in because it provides them a way to make a living. Life is a daily struggle to find enough salvageable garbage to sell in order to buy a little food and at the same time to survive the many health risks and physical hazards of the dump. Such as spontaneous fires that are difficult to extinguish and leave behind trash that is extremely hot, or bulldozers that push the garbage around and don’t watch out for people.

This story is inspired by real-life Sang Ly who lives at Stung Meanchey, a Cambodian garbage dump, with her husband Ki Lim and 16-month-old son Nisay. Not surprisingly Nisay is very sick, and Sang Ly is desperate to find help for him. None of them have learned to read so a major theme is the importance of reading and stories in our lives. Inserted in the middle of this book is a separate short story about Sarann, similar to Cinderella. Sopeap Sin, also called The Cow or Rent Collector, is a bitter, angry woman who has lived at the dump longer than anyone can remember. She is strict about collecting the rent on time and spends the rest of the month drinking cheap rice wine. The other residents don’t know her background, but the reader learns her story and it is powerful.

I read the original version of The Rent Collector when it was first published and gave it five stars so of course I was interested in reading the story again as an adaptation for young readers. Some content is still inappropriate for younger kids, such as a young girl who was to be sold into slavery, a boy beaten to death for theft, and people shot before your eyes. Overall, this is a positive story that will linger with you long after it is over. It opens the eyes of the reader to what life is like for so many people in other parts of the world and helps you see how much you have that you take for granted. Themes of friendship, the power of words, courage, selflessness, sacrifice, survival, and hope. I highly recommend it. Thanks to Shadow Mountain Publishing for an ARC to use for my review.

I thought this was a fantastic book for younger readers! Personally I think I would have preferred the original book written for an older audience, but I’ll definitely be recommending the book to reader relatives who are more in the middle grade demographic.
This book made me cry a lot, but also laugh! Sang Ly was a narrator who bought a lot of life to the story. She was so loving and determined that you just had keep reading because you wanted everything to work out for her and her family. The book also focused on the importance of literature and I greatly enjoyed reading the retelling of Cambodian stories and poems as well as read about Sang Ly discovering the joys of reading. I think this is the first novel I’ve read set in Cambodia so I appreciated learning about the country’s history and culture.
Even though Sang Ly and I are living in extremely different circumstances, the universal themes of community, and trying to do the best for your family, makes the characters seem relatable.
My only criticism is that the story wasn’t always cohesive, sometimes it seemed to jump from scene to scene. However, I still really enjoyed the book and I can imagine it becoming a classic to teach in schools. If the synopsis sounds interesting to you I would definitely pick it up!

This is an eye-opening book about people living in very different circumstances than one usually finds in America, adapted for younger readers from the author’s book of the same title. I thought the author did a great job of showing the conditions these people were living in and how they went about their lives. The voice felt authentic to me. The phrasing of the dialogue and the way emotion is described was foreign sounding to my ear, as it should be in a story about a different culture. I love the message of hope and the importance of literature to broaden our perspective.

If this is a version adapted for younger readers I can't even imagine how the original version must be heavier, more exciting, and shocking.
I wouldn't say this is a children's book, nothing about it made me think of a middle grade/children's book, if I didn't know I would say it's an adult book, so keep that in mind when reading.
I liked this story, it is a bit tiring in some parts but fascinating, you will definitely leave this book reflecting on life in general and the whole book is a great life lesson.
This book is about the difficulties of life and about stories, the power of words, and how people change people's lives.
It is also a very quotable book!
I recommend this story, I think everyone who reads it will take something valuable from this book.

I received a complimentary copy from the publisher all opinions expressed are entirely my own

This is my first Cameron Wright book and it was initially hard for me to read. The book follows a single mother who is trying to survive and does all she can by picking recyclables in the largest municipal dump in Cambodia .It is a story of hope ,the resilience of the human spirit and the strength of a mother.

I'm glad I read this book. It is not a light, fluffy fiction story. It is deep and has great meaning that can change the way you look at the world. It will make you think and reevaluate your life and what you see there.

Review from my 9 year old reader...

This book is amazing and I read it in three days every day after school!
Every time I read since I read this I think of Sang Ly because it relates, [which is weird] to many other books in weird ways.
It was an influencing loving story full of twists and turns which is very interesting for my taste.
Sang Ly was an interesting character and she is very courageous.
I would recommend it to other young readers including nine eight and ten years old. Sang Ly is a great and confident woman full of excitement and surprises on every page.
The author is a very tempting author and I would definitely read another one of her books.

This book is a wonderful adaptation for children! I knew that this story was not always going to be happy. The best stories definitely have their fair share of hardship. Sang Ly definitely struggles, but it's how she overcame and changed during those struggles that I absolutely loved! This story is truly beautiful! I definitely recommend!

Thanks to NetGalley and Shadow Mountain Publishing for providing the e-ARC in exchange for honest review.

This story is about Sang Ly and her family who lived at Cambodia's city dump and the struggles they face as they try to survive by selling what they can find in the garbage. Honestly, this is quite an eye-opening story about Cambodia's history, as this is my first time reading a book with this setting. Along the story, I felt heart-wrenching moments when there are hints of something bad will happen. But even though their life is hard and they need to struggle a lot to live day by day, they are happy with what they have. I love that the story shows the importance of family and how family members take care of each other, just like how Sang Ly and her husband wants to give the best for their son, Nisay who is ill.

Though I don't feel connected that much to the story and it takes me a while to get into it, it did make me feel sad and wishing the best for their family. I also appreciate that the story portrayed how people can get close by learning how to read and write, just like Sopeap and Sang Ly's friendship. This story is also suitable for young readers as there are many life lessons to learn from Sang Ly's story, so this is something worth to read.

My Thoughts:

This is a devastating and hopeful real life story about a mother who lives in Cambodiaʻs city dump. As she and her husband try to eke out a life, she is also desperate to help her sick baby. Tragedy seems to follow this little family through the whole book but when Sang Ly, the main character, realizes that the mean, drunk rent collector Sopheap knows how to read, Sang Ly takes a huge leap of faith to help her family.

In middle school where sometimes students are so obsessed with their own lives and troubles, this is a gripping book that will keep readers reading. This story has so many twists that it seems like fiction, but the picture of Sang Ly, her husband and baby just makes this story more important. This is a love story to the power of literacy and the power of literature to uplift humanity, no matter where we live. It also is a feel good story about the power of story telling to bring people together.

This is a great non-fiction book for the middle school classroom library.

From the Publisher:
Based on true events. Sang Ly lives at Cambodia's city dump and is grateful she can help earn a living for her family by sifting through the trash for recyclables and things which can be repaired and sold. On a good day, she can earn enough to buy food for her family. She needs enough good days so she can pay the rent collector, Sopeap--a grumpy old woman who shows no mercy and who is willing to evict any tenant who can't pay their rent on time.

When Sang Ly is unable to pay her rent for the month, she fears her family will have to leave the dump and their shanty home--a place where her only possessions can be carried in two hands. Little does she know that a discarded children's book found among the mounds of trash would save her. When Sopeap sees the book lying on Sang Ly's cardboard bed, her mood changes. Sang Ly offers her the book if she is allowed to keep her family at the dump.

An unlikely friendship develops between the two women, and Sang Ly learns that Sopeap knows how to read--something Sang Ly has always wanted to learn. Being able to read could transform Sang Ly's world beyond the predictable confines of the dump and lead to a future with possibilities and hope. But the rent collector has a secret and tragic past, one that will not be easy for Sang Ly to navigate. With the help of her supportive husband, Ki Lim, and a helpful and humorous boy, Lucky Fat, Sang Ly embarks on a life-changing journey to give her young son, Nisay, a better life and future.

The Rent Collector is about the power of literacy, the influence of the past, and finding hope, resiliency, and empowerment in the face of seemingly endless hardship.

Publication date April 5, 2022, Author Camron Wright

**Thank you to Netgalley and Shadow Mountain Publishing for an eARC of this title in exchange for an honest review. This in no way changed my rating.**

I am floored by the amount of positive reviews for this. I can only reason this is because the reviews are from readers who are overwhelmingly not BIPOC, but from the minute I read the Author’s Note, I knew it was going to be rough. This is the BIPOC equivalent of books and stories about disabled people that are designed to make able-bodied people thankful they are able-bodied and pity the disabled. The author includes a long note about hugging your parents and being grateful you have a bed, which is fine, until he “invites you into the dump”, setting the protagonist, Sang Ly, up to be pitied IMMEDIATELY. There are genuinely beautiful areas of Cambodia and this is likely to be the only way that many teens experience the culture. Setting the idea up that Cambodia is this filthy country and that it’s people are illiterate and living in squalor is not ideal, especially for kids who likely haven’t really examined nuance extensively.

Additionally, I have seen some reviews praising the fact that this book "examines the Khmer Rouge Revolution." This is inaccurate. It BARELY touches on it and does so in a way that explains "The Khmer Rouge was bad and anti-education" but doesn't explain what happened to lead to the revolution or how it was toppled. It's like saying a book "examines" slavery if a character says "I was enslaved and now I'm not. The end." I'm sure there are many books that are about the Khmer Rouge that would be more fitting for that topic than this one.

The book is very fatphobic towards Sopeap for the majority of the book, calling her "the Cow", making jokes about her "sitting on people" and describing her walk as "waddling." The jokes only stop once Sopeap becomes someone of value to the characters. That is very offensive, as a plus-size person, and reinforces the idea often found in children's books that plus-size people have to "earn" the right to be seen as a person and not a punchline.

Lastly, for a book set in Cambodia and about Literature, there is a STAGGERING amount of Western Literature Canon referenced in this book to a student where it wouldn't always make sense to reference. The stand out example is telling the story of Sarann (The Cambodian version of Cinderella). Sopeap explains to Sang Ly that this story has hundreds of versions all over the world (mostly referencing Western countries again) and says "We all want to be Sarann or Tattercoats or Cinderella." This is fully for the Western child reading it, but once was enough for them to understand, if they even needed that to be spoon-fed to them. Many of them likely would have understood that it was similar to Cinderella just from the story alone. To constantly reference "Sarann OR CINDERELLA" was unnecessary and unrealistic, as that reference wouldn't mean anything to Sang Ly. It's not good writing.

So over all, I can't say that I recommend this book. The representation is there for Western audiences to pity Cambodians, implying the country is dirty and illiterate, and full of fatphobia and half-assed "History". It's meant to "inspire" people into realizing how good their lives are by lowering someone else and that is not something I'm interested in promoting nor something that I'm interested in recommending to children. I would try to find another book with better History if you or your child is interested in Cambodia.

Edit: I realized I forgot to address the cover. I get that it's a Young Readers edition of this story, but it feels weird and infantilizing to me to portray a grown, married woman with a baby as a preteen at best on the cover. I fully expected this story to be about a child based on the cover and was surprised she's got a husband and a two-year old. That was also a miss for me.

Thank you to the publisher and author for allowing me to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I hadn't heard much about the original novel, just that it had been recommended to me a while back, so when I saw the Young Readers Edition I thought it would be a great book to read and possibly introduce to my fifth grade daughter's book club.

But while I enjoyed the story and the underlying theme, and thought it would probably work for the intended audience of younger readers, there were a couple of deal breakers.

The first was the voice, or the tone. This is a book that may have worked better in third person. Sang Ly’s voice did not match that of an uneducated person living in poverty. Her language was lyrical, the words advanced, she herself was very outspoken, and her voice/tone just seemed off to me. Perhaps it’s because the author is a white male writing first person for a Cambodian woman. Didn’t work. Instead of sounding like a young destitute Cambodian mother living in a large city dump, it sounded like a white man. Not authentic at all.

The second was the prechiness. I do appreciate the underlying message of education and literacy, and how stories can help us. And the feeling of hope. But it came off a bit preachy. And not realistic. I’m not sure how much of this is due to this being adapted for Young Readers.

I did enjoy the friendship between Sang Ly and Sopeap. I enjoyed Sopeap’s story. I found her to be a compelling character.

As an Asian woman who reads a lot of fiction written by Asian authors, I wish this author had taken more care with this story and did not take the liberties with writing a first person narrative. Basing a whimsical story on real people living through hardships is ignorant, insensitive, and off-putting. Telling it in first person without experiencing it is upsetting.

Such a heartwrenching book, but at the same time so full of hope. Living on a dump, but they are still alle to love love and laugh. It taught me that i was Rich on the material things. I have electricity i have a home , i have clean water and i have a bed. It also taught me not to judge people on appearance. Get to know the person . I.highly recommend this book. Thank you to netgalley for this e arc in exchange for an honest opinion

Since this was adapted for young readers, I actually liked how it was written: simple and straight-forward. The book had some of its good and not-so-good moments. I liked the interactions between Sang Ly and Sopeap, and how their friendship grew. The book reveals the harsh realities of extreme poverty, inaccessible healthcare, and a corrupt government. It's also a story of love, perseverance, and motherhood. But what I enjoyed the most was the emphasis given on the power of words and how literature can change lives.

What I didn't enjoy was that the pacing was not consistent. There were times it gets really slow and boring. But overall, I enjoyed this book.

I read an adapted for younger readers version. .Extremely engaging story which I found hard to put down and stop thinking about.. I would recommend for ages 12+. I did find the last few chapters felt a bit rushed and a tad confusing, but that could be from the adaptation. It enhanced some of my understanding about Cambodia and literature.

OK, so first off, I thought this is a real story. But turns out it's inspired by it, the author saw this documentary and wanted to write a book about it, ok. I feel like if this was written by a Cambodian author or someone who's been there it would have given me more peace of mind knowing that it is authentic. But, others say that it is, so I'll take their word. Also, this one is an adaptation from the 'best selling' book for young readers, so I'd say the horrifying stuff is really let down, so good...
I didn't know much about Cambodia, the revolution, or anything really, so I'd say this was very educational as I learned a LOT!
It's a story about Sang Ly, who lives in Stung Meanchey, the largest municipal waste dump in Cambodia with her husband Kim and her baby Nisay. They're very poor and they earn their living by scavaging junk and paying rent for their 'house' to this woman Sopeap Sin. So everyone who lives there knows her as an angry and selfish woman who drinks a lot, but then Sang Ly discovers that she can read... And well the story starts out, as you see how many people there can read, and well Sang Ly is eager to learn. This is a story about hope, love, never giving up, redemption, forgiveness, and learning. I really liked learning about characters' backstories and reading the stories that Sang Ly was reading along. It was very fun and a quick sweet read, that I don't think I will forget about soon.
The only thing that didn't sit well with me to give 5 stars, was the ending (it wasn't satisfactory enough about Sang Ly's story and stuff) and that I find it weird that the author wrote a story using real-life people and made up their stories...
But anyway, I highly recommend this, it's sweet, emotional and a very wonderful story!

I never knew that there are people with families living in a dump site and had to pay rent! It is an eye opener for me. This book is about Sang Ly who has been living there ( Stung Meanchey - the largest municipal waste dump in Cambodia) since she was born and how a book saved her. Not only that, it reminded me of why I love literature.

“They try to live life from the trash that others throw away” This line saddened me so much. It took me awhile to continue to read the book. Knowing that it is based on true events, I had to know what it is all about.

Life in the dump site is war everyday. They have to be very strong physically and mentally to survive there. It breaks my heart when I read about things that had happened there. Things they need to do to survive shows how much some people are suffering in this world and it is very difficult to grasp that such livelihood exists 😣.
Knowing that some of them would help each other to survive despite they themselves are struggling to even find food gives me a slight relief.

How a book saved Sang Ly and her family? This is something so remarkable. “I don’t expect reading to make his body well. But I trust reading will give him a reason to fight. I believe reading will fill him with courage” This is when Sang Ly’s life changed. Sopeap Sin the Rent Collector who is well known to be not a pleasant woman taught Sang Ly how to read and how she changed Sang Ly’s life. From here on I read how a mother would do anything for her family. How a woman had suffered for years to survive. It gave me hope and the encouragement for me to live my life to the fullest. It also shows how powerful knowledge is. As for Sang Ly, the power to be able to read and her reading passion taught her about life.

This book is adapted for young readers. A good book for middle grade students. It has a lot of incidents that can be discussed. Such as responsibilities, love , friendship , hard work and many more. The language is simple and easy to understand.

Will definitely read the original version .

“Words are like ropes.” She finally answers. “We use them to lift ourselves up, but if we are not careful, they can also bind us down when they do, it's usually at our own undoing.”

Sang Ly makes her living at Cambodia's largest waste dump, Stung Meanchey scavenging for recyclables alongside her husband Ki Lim. Life is challenging for them, and on top of that their son, Nisay is chronically ill.

Each month is struggle to make the rent so that they can continue living in what they consider home. So when they are unable to make rent, Sang Ly goes to see Sopeap Sin, the rent collector, she is not really well-liked among the other garbage collectors, but as Sang Lyn finds out no one really knows her.

I couldn’t help but think this was a good take on learning to “love your enemy” because Sang Ly and all who live in Stung Meanchey didn’t like Sopeap Sin, but through circumstances, she begins to learn how to read because Sopeap Sin agrees to teach her. She discovers the world of literature and how reading can alter your worldview. I liked the friendship that emerged from two very different women, and yet are all struggling with something similar: life.

My gratitude to Shadow Mountain and Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

I am reading this for a Best Books for Kids Committee and didn't find that it had any appeal for children,