Book Review: Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in
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Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West by Blaine Harden
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a story that needs to be heard by more of the world. It’s the story of a young man, born and raised inside the twisted morality of North Korea’s political prisons. His escape is an event of unimaginable importance to our understanding of North Korea’s crimes, and yet has been met with no fanfare. His settlement into western society and the re-education necessary to survive our modern world are non-events. There is no parade for this hero, and precious little help.
Harden tells the story without being overdramatic or hysterical. There’s a delicate remove, and he’s careful not to dwell on the horrors that could have made a work like this into a rubbernecker’s paradise. He chooses to look at examples of how Shin Dong-hyuk’s worldview was twisted, how the unimaginable was perfectly normal to him.
Something everyone should read, in order to get a handle on this particular piece of the puzzle that is modern Asia, the insane depths of North Korea’s human rights violations, and the difficulties involved in potentially needing to rescue an entire nation from a Concentration Camp.
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