Grasp La Vie Volée De Jun Do Edited By Adam Johnson PDF
man. i really wanted to enjoy this, i havent read any books about north korea and thought the plot sounded really interesting, but satire and i do not mix, so this ended up not being my cup of tea,
i do think the story fictionally depicts as much as an american can possibly speculate about a country and its regime that is so shrouded by secrets and isolation.
so of course the story is going to lean into the fear and horror westerners associate with it, and i actually did start off liking jun do as a character, i totally empathised with his situation in the beginning, but it gets to a point where everything is just sooo over the top, that i completely disconnected from his story.
and i understand that the whole bizarre messedup tragedy of it all is the point, but it just wasnt doing it for me.
im sure there are plenty of readers who will appreciate and enjoy the dark humour and social satire in this, but its just personally not my kind of thing.
.stars Find all of my reviews at: sitelink blogspot. com/
“A John Doe has an exact identity, Its just yet to be discovered, ”
Well looky looky I completed the Winter Reading Challenge and received my major award,
sitelink
My final stop on my “Passport to Everywhere” was everyones favorite dream vacay destination.
sitelink
And with a Pulitzer Winner even! I know what youre thinking, and my response to you is.
. .
sitelink
Or not because I read this one supah wrong and thought it was booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooring and also if this can win the Pulitzer then why didnt The Interview win the Oscar.
Whatever the case, I read it and even wrongreading counts when it comes to getting free swag so yay me.
sitelink
Many thanks to my awesome library for creating these challenges and handsome rewards each year.
I poopooed the notion of this theme when I first saw it, but have now traveled to Sweden, Alaska, Fallujah, Russia and North Korea because of it and removed books from my TBR that would have remained there indefinitely if it werent for this forcing of my hand.
sitelink If Mike Reynolds hadn't raved about this book I probably wouldn't have read it, Here's his review:
sitelink goodreads. com/review/show/
I'm glad I read The Orphan Master's Son, however, so thanks, Mike,
Why wouldn't I have read this novel without Mike's recommendation Well, I'm leery of any book about another culture that hints of an uplifting, inspirational tale about overcoming obstacles or whatever.
I hate that shit. It's not that I hate feeling uplifted but those stories, in my eyes, tend to minimize third world horrors and leave American whitey feeling good while sending the subtle message that poor people without food and medicine would be fine if they flew kites or won game shows or discovered love is the answer.
In movies, by the way, this is called the Slumdog Millionaire effect,
But The Orphan Master's Son emerges from a different species, Adam Johnson did crazy research and maintains an epic, jawdropping sense of small details, And while a reader could finish the novel and say, “Man, North Korea is a fucked up place”, this book is about more than North Korea's toxicity.
It works as a suspense thriller where you want to skip to the end because you have to know what happens.
The narrative blends time and characters across the landscape you have to read closely to catch the nuances, And the themes of sacrifice and identity emerge in fascinating ways, Life is brief and barbaric for many in Johnson's North Korea the effect is both numbing and overwhelming, And while Jun Do, the main character, has his noble elements, he's much more complex than any lead in a movie that's going to win a feelgood Oscar.
Were I betting man and seriously, I'm not, I hate casinos I would put big money on The Orphan Master's Son taking home a briefcase full of literary awards.
Can you bet on literary awards, by the way Can you call a phone number and somewhere in a smoky bar a bookie picks up, and you say, “I want David Foster Wallace attoon the Nobel” I have no idea.
This novel subverted what I expected from narrative and character in the best way possible, How often do you get to say that Check it out before all those annoying award stickers land on the front covers of new editions.
There are many books I've loved, many writers I've admired, some whose talent has been aweinspiring, But it's not often that I read a novel wondering “how the hell did he/she do that” This is one of those times.
How did Adam Johnson imagine his way into the dystopia of Kim JongIl's North Korea and create a world so real to the reader that when Americans show up, they seem oddly alien
The book is darkly comic and desperately sad, always teetering on the brink of complete absurdity but true in its heartbreaking depiction of people just trying to survive the stories of their lives that the state has determined for them.
“Where we are from, . . stories are factual. If a farmer is declared a music virtuoso by the state, everyone had better start calling him maestro, And secretly, hed be wise to start practicing the piano, For us, the story is more important than the person, If a man and his story are in conflict, it is the man who must change, ”
In the first part of the book, the protagonist, Pak Jun Do, is plucked from the orphanage run by his father and becomes a fighter in the tunnels under the demilitarized zone, then a kidnapper, a spy at sea intercepting radio transmissions, and, when a mission to Texas goes hilariously wrong, a prisoner in a mining camp.
In part two, the picaresque gives way to intrigue and romance among the upper echelons and the Dear Leader himself as Jun Do evolves from a tool of the state to a man determined to fashion his own story.
This is a remarkable accomplishment, at once compellingly readable and scarily disorienting, It is every bit as good as you've heard, “In my experience, ghosts are made up only of the living, people you know are out there but are forever out of range”
Adam Johnson, The Orphan Master's Son
One of my favorite novels of the year, and definitely my favorite novel set primarily in North Korea I've read four others, or five.
This is one of those
contemporary novels like sitelinkThe Son by Meyer or Carey's sitelinkTrue History of the Kelly Gang, or Udall's sitelinkThe Lonely Polygamist that delivers almost everything I search for in a book: originality, amazing prose, fantastic characters, meaning.
These novels might not be 'sitelinkWar and Peace' or 'sitelinkMobyDick' but they definitely show that fiction isn't even close to being dead.
Johnson is able to examine such themes as propaganda, stories, the concept of self and identity, totalitarianism love, memory, etc.
, in a novel way. This book deserves a spot among the other great totalitarian prison books Koestler's 'sitelinkDarkness at Noon', Orwell's sitelink.
Even though only a part of this novel is actually set in a prison, I'd argue that all totalitarian literature is at heart a subgenre of prison literature.
The book is undoubtedly written by a master word smith, It is a tour de force through a dark plot and story line, The author spent several years researching the book, including visiting the Democratic People's Republic of Korea North Korea, I find the word 'democratic extremely out of place and ironic here, as most other people would do, but won't indulge in any comment about it.
Looking in from the outside with no knowledge of a people and a country, might not be the right place or time to comment on a system as such.
It is acknowledged outside its borders as a totalitarian regime though,
The journalistic approach of the author to highlight the torture in the book, also leaves me with a lack of emotional bonding with the story or the characters.
The cold, harsh, uncompromising feel of the people, being treated like animals easy to get rid of instantly, disposable assets, or liabilities of the country, left me with a feeling of sterile apathy.
It should have been different, I am sure, Perhaps it is understandable that objectivity can be pushed too far, particularly in this situation where the author is a foreigner to the country.
Play it safe. He did, yes. Too safe, perhaps Yet, different stories are presented on different levels by different narrators, including the possibility of love in a world devoid of feeling and individualism.
John Doe, in the western lexicon a noman, became Jun Do in the story about a child who grew up in an orphanage as the son of the orphan master.
He wasn't an orphan himself, but grew up and identified with the orphans in the social milieu he was forced to endure, namely to be raised by the state and then ultimately become a victim of the system.
The children were shipped off everywhere to do manual labor, wherever they were needed, Thus, Jun Do became a tunnel assassin, a kidnapper, spy, English translator, a hero, a traveler to Texas, an impostor, and ultimately a prison inmate.
Not that it was the end of the story as yet!
The narrative celebrates the horror of torture chambers, unimaginable hunger, robotic lifestyles of people afraid of the system and the consequences of wrong thoughts, words or acts.
Grim in all its splendor,
Yet, the people also planted flowers to put on the graves of the heroes in the Revolutionary Martyrs' Cemetery.
Nocturnal raids ensures a good meal for more desperate people when the blooms become a source of valuable food for some.
:"Part Two: The Confessions of Commander Ga
"Always they are stealing flowers,” Sun Moon remarked as they passed by.
“It sickens me. My greatuncle is in there, you know, Do you know what that says to our ancestors, how it must insult them”
Ga asked her, “Why do you think they steal the flowers”
“Yes, thats the question, isnt it Who would do that Whats happening to our country”
He stole a brief glance, to confirm her disbelief.
Had she never been hungry enough to eat a flower Did she not know that you could eat daisies, daylilies, pansies, and marigolds That hungry enough, a person could consume the bright faces of violas, even the stems of dandelions and the bitter hips of roses"
The narrative promises a good ending as though the reader needs to stick to the story and not leave after the first half was concluded.
There must have been more readers such as yours truly, who wanted to turn my back on it and just walk away.
Where was it heading Was the book a proAmerican propaganda tool, forcing the reader to accept a particular viewpoint despite the effort to remain calculatingly objective
"And of Commander Ga However lacking, however feeble you have judged his character, know that this is a story of growth and redemption, one in which enlightenment is gained by the lowliest of figures.
Let this story be an inspiration when dealing with the weakminded who share your communal housing blocks and the selfish who use all the soap in your group bathing wells.
Know that change is achievable and that happy endings do come, for this story promises to have the happiest ending you will ever hear.
"
Despite the fact that I found the characters distant and unlovable with no emotional bartering possible between me and them, the book is informative and entertaining.
It is extremely wellwritten and captivating, I am thinking about the collective story of a country being dictated and written by a totalitarian despotthe Kim regime in the statecontrolled media outlets and how the character of Jun Do, created by the author, can perhaps be the collective persona of a nation.
It is impossible to emotionally bond with an entire country, but giving the people a collective personality and calling 'them' Jun Do, actually worked very well, if it WAS planned this way.
The author did not overstep his own boundaries by trying to represent people he does not know or haven't met.
He tells the story of people who dare not talk for themselves and respectfully maintains his distance without standing too far removed from the situation.
It is an excellent rendition of documentary realism,
As a novel it was a good read, The characters became people in the end, There's a little bit of American dramatization in the final moments, with an ending leaving the reader sad but happy.
However, I almost stopped reading after the first part, due to the excessive torture and neurotic, depressing tale, Alas, another ending would have left me with buyers remorse, I'm glad it did not happen!
But yes, this book is worth a try,
.