#camron wright

[haveyoureadthisbook-poll]

Have you read The Rent Collector by Camron Wright (2012)?

yes

no

I didn't finish it

I've never heard of it

Voting ended onJul 23, 2025

[horsesarecreatures]

Book review: The Rent Collector by Camron Wright

This book was short but excellent. It takes place in Cambodia in Stung Meanchey, the largest municipal dump where some people live and make their living collecting garbage. The main character is Sang Ly, a young woman originally from the countryside. She lives at the dump with her husband Ki Lim and their infant son, Nisay. Nisay has been sick from birth. When he is taken to Western doctors, he gets better while on medicine, but always worsens when it runs out, despite the doctor’s assurances that he will be fine. 

One day Sopeap Sin comes around to collect their rent. She is an ugly old drunk who constantly berates Ki Lim and the other tenants. Ki Lim had enough money to pay the rent for the month and some left over, but was robbed by one of the gangs at the dump. Sopeap tells Sang Ly that she will evict them if they don't have the money by the next night. 

The only positive thing to come out of the day was that Ki Lim  found a beautiful picture book for Nisay. None of them can read, but Sang Ly makes up a story as she shows Nisay the pictures the next day, When Sopeap comes around again for the rent money, she is about to berate Sang Ly and have them thrown out, but falls silent when she sees the book. She has a strong emotional reaction to it and is on the verge if tears. Sang Ly insists that she take the book. Sopeap does, and forgives the month’s rent.

Meanwhile, Sang Ly reflects on how strange the incident was. She realizes that Sopeap must know how to read. She has a crazy idea that maybe Sopeap could teach her to read, too, and that way, she can help Nisay have a better future and get him out of the dump. 

Sopeap is initially against the idea of teaching Sang Ly. However, before she was the rent collector at the dump, she used to teach literature at a university. She thought those better days were behind her, but changes her mind. She agrees to teach Sang Ly for a bottle of expensive rice wine each week. 

Sang Ly falls in love with literature. Over time, she sees another side of Sopeap, and begins to cherish her as a friend. However, it is clear that Sopeap is hiding many things and is not well. Sang Ly must find ways to help both her son and Sopeap. 

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A cool thing about this book is that while it is fiction, Sang Ly, Ki Lim, Nisay, and a couple of other characters are real people that live at Stung Meanchey.

[infpisme]

[earnestlyeccentric]

The Orphan Keeper

Author: Camron Wright Rating: 3/5 Seven-year-old Chellamuthu is kidnapped and taken to a Christian orphanage. He is later adopted by an American family, which is an overwhelming experience in and of itself. Spoilers ahead. Continue reading The Orphan Keeper

[bookcoversonly]

Title: The Rent Collector | Author: Camron Wright | Publisher: Shadow Mountain (2012)

[readsbymoonlight]

"Good," she said. "Seek dharma, child. Find out how you fit in, who you are. Remember that everything around you has a purpose. Even you."

Papathi Iyer

Camron Wright, The Orphan Keeper

[readsbymoonlight]

Book: The Orphan Keeper

Author: Camron Wright

Rating: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕

Recommended for: Kids, young adults, adults, EVERYONE

Published: 4th October, 2022

So, time to spill the beans—I didn't actually realise this version is for younger readers despite knowing there's another one already published with the same title. For some reason, I totally justified it as yeah, okay, they're just republishing it, nbd. But okay, I can see in hindsight that how it's likely been pared down and with some very moral of the story bits. Even so, I think it can be consumed by readers of all ages and I actually feel like reading the adult version too. Not now, though. Maybe some day.

Perhaps it's tough to imagine how getting kidnapped as a kid and shipped off to be adopted by parents of a completely different ethnicity and background half a world away can be made into a palatable story. But lbr we've read darker things as kids. But Camron Wright is an amazing writer who managed to balance humour and solemnity excellently. Personally, it took a bit of time to get immersed in the story, but once I did, it was a lightning-fast read. Well, compared to my reading speed this year, at least. I thought the way the book was written was very fragmented and pulls you out of the flow of the story. However, these elements tie up beautifully once you reach the end. Even though it was slightly jarring, the staccato beats of some seemingly unrelated anecdotes can be considered as setting the tone, laying groundwork, injecting flavour. So it's fine.

The book might better be served if split into two sections since that was essentially how the story-telling went. There's a huge gap between the time our protagonist, Taj Rowland, just arrived in the US and when he's grown up and graduating high school and beyond. It's like a movie style fast forward without the convenient scene change/montage. At the same time, I'm not very sure how the introduction that says "some of it is fiction" affects the experience of other readers. For me, it made me feel prejudiced against it for some reason. While I understood that it's unfair to claim that stories like these are purely true or purely fiction considering it's a lived experience by people and people forget things, I still got influenced by the idea that it should be more black and white. Which was very wrong of me, and it affected my own enjoyment of the book. Thankfully, I got over that quick.

When it comes down to it, this book is a great read because it's real. If it served as the basis for a completely fictionalised story, I think it would still be amazing because, at its heart, it is about life and how it can be sometimes. There's no easy happy ending and every turn prompts you to give up. But in the end, that's exactly what makes the resolution worth it, especially because Taj could have very well failed to find his family despite trying so hard. But he did and we can all witness his journey.

Disclaimer: e-ARC obtained from NetGalley, photo found on Google

[teenageread]

Review: The Orphan Keeper

Synopsis:

Seven-year-old Chellamuthu’s life—and his destiny—is forever changed when he is kidnapped from his village in Southern India and sold to the Lincoln Home for Homeless Children. His family is desperate to find him, and Chellamuthu anxiously tells the Indian orphanage he is not an orphan, that he has a mother who loves him. But he is told not to worry as he will soon be adopted by a loving family in America.

Chellamuthu is suddenly surrounded by a foreign land and a foreign language. He can’t tell people that he already has a family and becomes consumed by a single, impossible question: How do I get home? But after more than a decade, home becomes a much more complicated idea as the Indian boy eventually sheds his past and receives a new name: Taj Khyber Rowland.

It isn’t until Taj meets an Indian family who helps him rediscover his culture and family history that he begins to discover the truth he has all but forgotten. Taj is determined to return to India and begin the quest to find his birth family. But is it too late? Is it possible that his birth mother is still looking for him? And which family does he belong to now?

Plot:

Chellamuthu looks like a typical Indian child, growing up in the streets of Erode, India. His mother loved him, his father wanted him to go down the right path, feet were constantly dirty, and he was  always getting into trouble. Chellamuthu may not have the american standard of life, but he was happy. His parents practice traditional teachings, such as burning of the feet when Chellamuthu was going down a dark path stealing from vendors. Chellamuthu knew his family was not rich, but he was loved. So when an older boy lured Chellamuthu away to a van, which drove him three hours away to an orphanage, Chellamuthu knew it was a mistake. Sure he ate better, had clean clothing, and a comfortable mat to sleep on each night, Chellamuthu knew he did not belong, that he had a family to go back to. Eli, the Commissioner for the Lincoln Home of Homeless Children, tried to explain to Chellamuthu that his parents could not take care of him anymore, thus selling him to this home which was going to adopt him out to American couples; he knew they were lying. Only once Eli had him, passport in hand, on a plane to Linda and Fred Rowland, that Chellamuthu knew his life was over. Going by an easier to pronounce name of Taj Khyber Rowland, Taj forgot all of his Indian roots, and grew up the all american boy. Feeling distant from his American family, Taj does a year abroad to London, where he begins to relearn his Indian culture. Determined to find out what happened to him, Taj begins to embrace his Indian side, dates Indian girls, and scrap and save to get himself back into Indian, and tries to piece together where he came from, and who his parents are.  

Thoughts: 

Camron Wright rewrites the tale of Chellamuthu into a young-readers novel, so middle grades youth can also enjoy this awe inspiring story. Starting the novel off with a “dear young readers” letter from Taj, the story is told from a third person point of view of Chellamuthu as he grows up in India, his way to the United States, becoming Taj Rowland, and how as an adult he goes back to India to figure out who he was. As this story takes place both in India and the United States, Wright writes in a sense of the importance of Taj’s multiculturalism. How he is both Indian, but also American, and how those sides of him make up who he is as a whole. You really feel the sense of Taj being lost, both in America as he was the only Indian for miles, but also lost in London/India surrounded by a culture he was unfamiliar with. This book, about Taj’s life, has the underlying message of the quest to claim your identity, and discover who you are through going back to your heritage and roots. With easy to understand writing, Wright keeps this book smooth by going through Taj’s life at a pretty rapid pace. With twists and turns to keep the plot interesting, you really feel like you grew up with Taj after meeting him at age 7, and leaving with him as an adult. With pictures included to show readers Taj’s real life, this book is worth the read for young readers and others.

Read more reviews: Goodreads

Buy the book: Amazon