This book is honest and heartbreaking, even more so because it is written from the raw perspective of a child. The author doesn't try to rationalize or gloss over any of the feelings or thoughts she had as a child, and it makes this book all the more real.

For me, this is a 'must read', because we all need to educate ourselves on the different dictatorships that have plagued so many countries around the globe in the past - and those who still do so today. We need to learn about the past to be better equipped to prevent such awful things from ever happening again.

A note on the audiobook:
The production is great, but I was a bit confused because there are two or three chapters in the book where the author describes events she wasn't present for. Sometimes they were described to her later, sometimes she imagines what might have happened. In the audiobook, those chapters are treated just like all the others, which confused me, because it was an element of fiction in a non-fiction autobiography. But I was told that in the book or e-book, those chapters are clearly marked, so that's just an audiobook problem.