You are here

The Road of Lost Innocence: The True Story of a Cambodian Heroine

Author: Somaly Mam

Random House Circle, New York, 2009, pp. 224

Memoir by a Cambodian activist against sexual slavery, whose organizations have tried to rescue, shelter and teach girls and women escaping from sexual exploitation in Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and more generally. She received high level international support, but the credibility of her claims to have been sent to a brothel as a child, and of her most lurid examples of abuse in the sex industry, was challenged in a Newsweek report, 21 May 2014. An interview and report in Marie Claire 16 September 2014 in turn queried some of the allegations and interpretations of the Newsweek story. Mam is still involved in campaigning and fund raising, but controversy continues about her role, management of her campaigns, and the extent of exploitation in the sex industry.