Synopsis:
Human rights activist Park, who fled North Korea with her mother in 2007 at age 13 and eventually made it to South Korea two years later after a harrowing ordeal, recognized that in order to be “completely free,” she had to confront the truth of her past.
It is an ugly, shameful story of being sold with her mother into slave marriages by Chinese brokers, and although she at first tried to hide the painful details when blending into South Korean society, she realized how her survival story could inspire others. Moreover, her sister had also escaped earlier and had vanished into China for years, prompting the author to go public with her story in the hope of finding her sister.
Rating: 🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤
“We all have our own deserts. They may not be the same as my desert, but we all have to cross them to find a purpose in life and be free.”
– In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park
I’d been wanting to read this memoir for a few years now and was torn at how riveting raw, and terrifyingly real this novel was.
5 stars does not do this memoir justice. No amount of stars will.
Yeonmi Park was born in North Korea in 1993. She wrote a first-hand account of her experiences throughout her days growing up in the Hermit Kingdom and her harrowing and mostly terrifying escape to freedom. She reveals the truth behind the country’s borders and details her horrifying experiences when she escaped at the tender age of 13.
In Order To Live is the testimony to her strength and courage in overcoming her story to survive through sheer grit and desperation. Her story is one of great triumph in how she managed to survive hunger, poverty and unspeakable trauma. It seemed I was reading a dystopian novel… but set in real life. An isolated country with powerful leaders who oppressed their people with propaganda, and complete blind loyalty through everything they did.
Yeonmi is brave in sharing her story with the world. I couldn’t stop reading this memoir and was deeply moved and stricken by her experiences. I now feel extremely grateful and humbled by the many opportunities that I have. From the roof over my head, to the food on my table. We all seem to have it easy while in other parts of the world, a single grain of rice could be a miracle to many. Even something as simple as a hug, or show of affection such as love was mostly foreign to Yeonmi due to her country’s totalitarian rule.
I’m glad that I managed to read this and would like to thank Yeonmi, from the bottom of my heart for sharing her story. You truly, are a fighter and a voice to this world.
She fought for her freedom and still continues to bring light into North Korea’s situation. She fights for her people and gives them a voice for millions have yet to break out of that prison.
I have learned a lot from this memoir, from the way the government works to the citizens who are human… just like us. Despite their country’s totalitarian rule, there is still hope – that one day things will get better.
If you have any doubts about reading In Order To Live, cast them away. Your worldview will be changed and you will start to see the world and your life differently, just as I did.
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