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Dear Leader

Poet, Spy, Escapee - A Look inside North Korea

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Dear Leader

Written by: Jang Jin-sung
Narrated by: Daniel York
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About this listen

In this rare insider's view into contemporary North Korea, a high-ranking counterintelligence agent describes his life as a former poet laureate to Kim Jong-il and his breathtaking escape to freedom.

"The General will now enter the room."

Everyone turns to stone. Not moving my head, I direct my eyes to a point halfway up the archway where Kim Jong-il’s face will soon appear.

As North Korea's State Poet Laureate, Jang Jin-sung led a charmed life. With food provisions (even as the country suffered through its great famine), a travel pass, access to strictly censored information, and audiences with Kim Jong-il himself, his life in Pyongyang seemed safe and secure. But this privileged existence was about to be shattered. When a strictly forbidden magazine he lent to a friend goes missing, Jang Jin-sung must flee for his life.

Never before has a member of the elite described the inner workings of this totalitarian state and its propaganda machine. An astonishing exposé told through the heart-stopping story of Jang Jin-sung's escape to South Korea, Dear Leader is a rare and unprecedented insight into the world’s most secretive and repressive regime.

©2014 Jang Jin-Sung. All rights reserved. (P)2014 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved. Art & Literature Biographies & Memoirs Political Science Politics & Government South Korea Famine North Korea
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An insider point of view

I knew some of the details shared in the book about the Kims and their despotism but hearing it shared first hand with all the details is a whole other story . Also the details of escaping North Korea are just as scary. I've briefly bumped into people from North Korea but I never even remotely suspected the painful memories that may linger in their past. Up to even today I'm still shaken thinking how such a place can have "democratic" and "Republic" in its official name when its in fact the exact opposite of those.

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