Review: The Rent Collector

The Rent Collector by Camron Wright
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I did not like this book, which isn't to say that I didn't feel sympathy for the fictionalized characters in the story - I did. The book is set in one of Cambodia's largest garbage dumps, where a small family is struggling to get by. They earn a living by sorting trash and selling it, barely getting by. They live AT the dump, along with several of Cambodia's other poorest families.

The story is about their attempts to improve their lives - by learning to read, getting to the bottom of their son's illnesses, and creating a small safety net past what their landlady collects each month. Ironically it is their landlady (a cantankerous drunk) who teaches them to read and ultimately helps them.

I don't know where to start with what I disliked about this book. The writing was too simple, barely capturing any of the characters' inner voices past their obvious actions. The circumstances in which they lived were deplorable, but described unemotionally. And the story seemed both obvious and contrived. I later learned that it was based on a true story of a family - one that the author's son had filmed for a documentary. Perhaps that is the source of some of the problems - too much of a "movie/video" angle and not enough one of a book.

Whatever the case, not one of my favorites.

View all my reviews