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    In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom
    Unavailable
    In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom
    Unavailable
    In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom
    Audiobook9 hours

    In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom

    Written by Yeonmi Park

    Narrated by Eji Kim

    4.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Yeonmi Park was not dreaming of freedom when she escaped from North Korea. She didn't even know what it meant to be free. All she knew was that she was running for her life, that if she and her family stayed behind they would die - from starvation, or disease, or even execution.

    In Order to Live is the story of Park's struggle to survive in the darkest, most repressive country on earth; her harrowing escape to South Korea through China's underworld of smugglers and human traffickers; and her emergence as a leading human rights activist - all before her 21st birthday.

    Park was born to a family of civil servants in the North Korean city of Hyesan, along the Chinese border. She grew up in a society in which the regime controls everything you do, everything you learn, where you go, what you say, even what you think. In this warped world, famine was a way of life and minor offenses, such as watching foreign videos, could prove fatal.

    Park's family was relatively privileged until her father, a party member, was arrested for smuggling. After that, life in North Korea became a ceaseless battle against starvation. Escaping with her mother, Park began a long journey of unspeakable hardship and degradation through China and Mongolia, which finally yielded her freedom in South Korea. Today, Park is an influential leader of the younger generations of Korean dissidents and an internationally recognized advocate for human rights around the world.

    In the end, In Order to Live is about the resilience of the human spirit and the transcendent power of love to overcome the most ghastly horrors and the most hopeless circumstances. "I had to learn how to love others," says Yeonmi Park. "And now I am willing to die for them."

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateSep 29, 2015
    ISBN9780698410497
    Unavailable
    In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom
    Author

    Yeonmi Park

    Yeonmi Park is a North Korean defector and human rights activist. She escaped the brutal Kim dictatorship as a teenager only to fall victim to sex trafficking in China, before escaping to South Korea by walking across the Gobi Desert. Eventually making her way to America, where she is now a citizen, Park has dedicated her life to bringing attention to the horrors and atrocities taking place in her home country and in China. Park is also the author of the international bestseller In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl’s Journey to Freedom. She is a graduate of Columbia University and lives in New York City.

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    Reviews for In Order to Live

    4.5/5

    227 ratings18 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I feel the true measure of a good documentary, or non-fiction book, is how angry I get. The angrier I am, the better it is; I was shaking within a few pages of In Order to Live. This is a terrific, horrifying and courageous read. It is unfathomable how awful the conditions were for Yeonmi Park in North Korea. How unfair it is that an entire civilization has to deal with being brutalized, humiliated, tortured and murdered by a regime that is filled with cowardly dictators. The lengths they go to brainwash their population would be hilarious, their obvious insecurities ripe for parody, if it wasn't true and they didn't kill and starve their own people on a daily basis. I was on the verge of tears many, many times reading this. Her courage throughout this journey is insane, and really puts my own problems into perspective.There were more than a few lines that hit me like a ton of bricks. I'm so glad Park survived her ordeal, and decided to write this book. Highly, highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      I noticed this book in the bookstore nearly 9 months ago and read my first 15 pages in one go, it took me all this time to get the book being ordered from library. Thus, the reading time is so long. ***contains some spoilers***I like the cover and it draw my attention, of course, I also knew what to expect as I have read a book by similar topic before, but I was interested to learn more and different perspective.Of course, this is author's personal experience and I am sure the book, and books written by those who have escaped must be read way more, their voices must be heard outside South Korea where they reside. The book is powerful, tragic, easy to read from cover to cover, I mean it's not "light" but it swallows your attention to details and I could imagine being in her shoes when she describes her first and things she had to learn, learn to think about herself, express herself, find a way in her own speech to use word "i like", "my favorite" it does sound dramatic. And make me think about what these people has to actually cope with and learn about. Learn how much everything is ahead of understanding...the way you were told all life, the way you had to learn to count from propaganda math books and how much you have actually missed. I was thankful for the photos, and it made me believe that at the end the author and her mother would find her sister, there will be something positive.The writer has been brave and stick to her aim to study and read, learn about South Korean lifestyle, learn to drop her N.korean accent. The book is about daily struggle and fight for something better, not always acting right and learning what you have done wrong, admit it and learn to leave it in the past.
    • 5/5
      In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom by Yeonmi Park I appreciate Park telling her story and including how hard it was for her to do so. It can be something that we miss sometimes when people write memoirs that not everyone has a story that they are comfortable with everyone knowing. Sometimes we have things that we'd rather keep hidden about ourselves and Park definitely relates that feeling. She includes the shame she felt at different times and her paths to overcoming it and the times when she didn't. She gives us her story so that we can understand the plight of those who share her circumstances but that often go unheard.
      I appreciate that she didn't get into the gory details. She discusses being raped and beaten (sexual violence being the most prominent trigger in this book), but she doesn't go into detail about how it happened. It's selfish of me to appreciate that but I do. This is not a comfortable book to read, but it's a necessary one and I get the impression that she didn't want to relive the details any more than I wanted to hear about them. But this didn't keep her from sharing what happened, she just laid it out there.
      The other thing to appreciate about this is that when we hear the way violence happens, we sometimes miss what it is. I know it sounds ridiculous, but it's possible to describe a beating or rape without using those two words and I feel like books that do that can miss something very important. They miss that these terms are used for actions that happen in a multitude of circumstances and are not designed for use for the perpetrator. Park says that she was raped and we don't miss it underneath the coercion that was used against her. The ability to name what has happened to you and not just describe the way it happened instead is powerful. It erases any idea that it could have been something else. It makes it clear to the reader that there is no question as to what happened and that the way it happened is less important than that it happened. To me, it was pretty powerful way to approach discussing that part of her story.
      I appreciate that she doesn't out others or tell their stories.
      I appreciate that she admits to having mixed feelings about people in her life, even those that trafficked or helped her.
      I appreciate describing the unusual relationship she has with religion between her North Korean upbringing and the missionaries she met.
      I appreciate the in-depth description of what it was like to live in North Korea as a child and all the ways that she was taught to think and to be a loyal subject.
      It's odd to say that I liked a book about such topics but Park made it easy to read and relate to. While it would be better to live in a world where these things didn't happen anymore, I appreciate that this book is out there to give an understanding of what it is like to go through all of this, to have to live with it and to try to get beyond it. It is essential for us to understand that this happens and how it happens in order to begin to work to eradicate it. Park knows this and even explains that this was a driving force behind her writing the book. So, yeah, I like the book. It's written well and it's important for us to read.
      I wouldn't recommend it for high school or young adults because of the content, despite that she was in this age group during most of the book. I'd recommend it for anyone at or above college age, especially those who are working to understand the way the world around them works. In Order to Live is for feminists who wish to reach out internationally and for aspiring human rights activists. It is for missionaries and aid workers who will probably run into women and girls who have been trafficked.
    • 5/5
      With the increasingly vitriolic rhetoric coming out of North Korea lately and the reactions of so many other nations to North Korea's missile launching, I became more curious about the history of this animosity. My knowledge of North Korea is very rudimentary, but I remember receiving the lingering Red Scare message that they were communist and, therefore, bad. But I recall an old proverb I had been taught in a college history class, the best lesson I received really: "Until lions have their own historians, tales of hunting will glorify the hunter." It made me start wondering what the history of North Korea and our involvement in that sphere of the world sounded from the other side.I found this story while searching for English translations of a North Korean history book. As you can imagine, my original search yielded next to nothing, but the description of In Order to Live was compelling.Yeonmi Park is a wonderfully gifted writer with a heart-wrenching description of her early life in North Korea, her flight to China, and her eventual escape to Seoul. The details she provides give a real insight into the average lives of North Koreans until the Kim regime. The indoctrination of the Korean people is devastating. Through her writing, I realize there is a special evil in that, if any other nation or group of nations organized in an attempt to remove Kim Jong-un from power and bring these people freedom, the regime would denounce those efforts as proof of our imperialistic designs against North Korea and the people would very likely believe it. The paradox is both mind boggling and heart breaking.Next, Yeonmi tells of how she and her mother escaped to China only to find themselves sold through human trafficking to various people. She is brutally honest, both in what happened to her and in the emotional/psychological repercussions that her experiences had on her. She details how the allied status between North Korea and China coupled with China's one child, boys preferred policy have created an atmosphere extremely conducive to lucratively trafficking North Korean women. Though Yeonmi points out that China did it's best to remove the evidence of this human trafficking epidemic leading up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, I can't help but wonder how much worse it's gotten now that the Olympics are long over and the world's eyes are no longer focused in that direction.Finally, she brings us with her to Seoul, South Korea, and the struggles she endured trying to settle into a new, very modernized way of life. The discrimination she faced that after everything she had already gone through may have broken a lot of people... to finally think yourself free and still find the way barred to you for being a foreigner.Her life is a testament to the human will to survive and even overcome astounding odds to thrive. Every other paragraph, I had to remind myself how young she was during each event in her life. Nobody should have to go through even a fraction of what she has survived and lived to speak out against.As heart breaking and humbling as her story is, what is more profound to me is that hers in one among how many thousands of defectors, each with a story that should be heard... her voice is one among tens of millions of North Koreans who don't even know they need a voice. She has given me a clearer insight into the brutality of the Kim regime in North Korea and enabled me to completely separate the people of the country from the dictator. The Hermit Kingdom is in desperate need of exposure to and help from the outside world. Yeonmi's brave book may just be one of the guiding lights that can start an inferno of transformation within her homeland.
    • 5/5
      This book was so enlightening and written straight from the heart. Don’t miss reading this one!!
    • 5/5
      Heavy heartening... highly recommending it and hope to see a free north Korea too some day. Love and warm thoughts to all the people there
    • 4/5
      When she was finally free and living in South Korea. Also when she was reunited with her father you could almost feel the intensity of their love through her words. The portrayal of life in North Korea as a little child was raw and sometimes difficult to hear but one monumental take from hearing the details led me to an even greater appreciation for being an American and growing up in the most wonderful country in the world!
    • 5/5
      A hard life to hear about but could not stop wanting to know more about Yoenmi's life. What a driven young woman to be able to continue on during unbearable life circumstances. I hope other North Koreans can escape to better lives, too.
    • 5/5
      Yeonmi's story is harrowing, and deeply moving. So few have been able to escape and come to America. Yeonmi's story includes her discovery and awareness of liberty, and of course if you've seen her second book or heard her speak, she warns that the academy of the west has been taken in by the same kind of ideological cult that infected North Korea. This book offers an account of Yeonmi's life and escape from the horror show of her birth place, and so serves also as a kind of warning we in the west should heed.
    • 5/5
      Wow. Just wow. Impossible to put into words my thoughts about her story of survival, perseverance, and ultimately her victorious journey to freedom. I was always aware of the Hermit Kingdom and the murderous antics of the dictators' family; but never had the story of the regime's cruelty driven home as well as Ms. Park has done. Can only pray that someday North Korea will be free of the despots that rule.
    • 4/5
      In Order to Live is one voice that reflects the voices of many North Korean refugees. The initial setting is in the border city of Hyesan where the lights of China can be seen. Yeonmi goes through periods of prosperity and famine while coming of age and undergoes great struggles outside her home country. After reading similar books on this subject, I say the highlight of her account in particular is her adjustment in South Korea. There is a range of attitudes of how South Koreans feel about North Koreans. There is also emotional development in Yeonmi in this period that touched me. On a side note, I found the anecdote about fertilizer amusing. This book can make someone feel a wide variety of emotions.
    • 4/5
      One of the most harrowing MeToo stories ever printed and one of the first I've seen about a mother and daughter who are both unwillingly trafficked into sexual slavery in China while trying to escape starvation in North Korea.
    • 3/5
      Narrated by Eji Kim. Through the media, the western world knows the North Korean government is crazy, but Yeonmi's story reveals the human face and toll of living under the repressive regime. Kim reads at a careful, deliberate pace in a British-accented voice. Her narration is robotic in quality and it takes time to warm up to. But as we hear of Yeonmi's horrific experiences and her need to shut down emotionally in order to survive, Kim's cool voice suits Yeonmi's harsh journey to freedom.

      This book is also suitable for high school teens.
    • 4/5
      When a book contains pictures, I usually look at them early on in my reading. What struck me was that the children in the pictures of North Korea weren't smiling. So sad!This is a story that is both horrifying and inspiring. The author is able to draw on inner strengths and resiliency that amaze me. It is also an essay on the pernicious effects of brainwashing and how it is used to stop people from thinking for themselves or exercising their free well. An important book about difficult issues, but ultimately an inspiring, triumphal story.
    • 4/5
      It is hard to write a review for someone's memoir.

      This book was incredibly difficult to read, and moving, and I felt myself really drawn into the story. I listened to it as an audiobook, read by Eji Kim, which I can highly recommend. I find it a lot easier to read non-fiction and memoirs if they are read to me.

      I, like a lot of people reading this book, didn't know a lot about North Korea, so it was interesting to learn more about a place I knew very little about.

      A few people are really upset by the inconsistencies in Yeomni Park's story, but I don't think those inconsistencies will change how I feel about the book, or the emotional reactions I had. Her story is a feat of strength and compassion and human will. She suffered from some serious trauma in her life, which I think more than justifies the inconsistencies in her story.

      More than anything, I loved the atmosphere that was created in this memoir, and while it wasn't perfect, or maybe even a little too linear, I think it's a story that needs to be told, over and over.

      Now that I've read this book I do want to read more books written by people who might be living under tough regimes, particularly books by women like Yeonmi Park.

      I don't know what else to say, just that you should read this book.

      (tw: rape scenes, sex trafficking, domestic abuse, suicidal ideation)

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      I got this audiobook on a whim knowing nothing about the author or her story prior. I just wanted something to listen to while I worked and knew I liked memoirs. Finishing this book I had to take a moment to regain control of my emotions. So beautifully written. I felt like I was there with Yeon Mi every step of the way through her heartbreaking tale. I recommend this book to anyone, especially those interested in human and women's rights.

      3 people found this helpful

    • 5/5
      The terrors Ms. Park and her family faced are almost unbelievable, but it is now common knowledge how monstrous the North Korean Kim regime is. This account is an extremely well told story of one family’s odyssey through the North Korean hell. Highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      At a mere 21 years, Yeon-Mi Park has lived a life that most of us could never even begin to fathom. She's an inspiration and I'm so glad that she has become a voice for people who do not have a voice of their own. A remarkable story, highly recommended.