Reviews tagging 'Child abuse'

In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom by Yeonmi Park, Maryanne Vollers

36 reviews

zoegrace's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

I cannot read this book enough times. There is so much substance and power in Yeonmi’s writing and storytelling.  II am so grateful to have read about Yeonmi’s  life and escape from North Korea. 

The narration is steady, clear and easy to understand. I find her voice so soothing which makes the challenging parts of the memoir easier to read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Medical trauma, Medical content, Death of parent, Child abuse, Trafficking, Toxic relationship, Domestic abuse, Deportation, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, and Sexual violence

eagerbones's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Pedophilia, Police brutality, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Slavery, Religious bigotry, Rape, Deportation, Genocide, Death, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, and Child abuse

Moderate: Death and Death of parent

Minor: Abandonment

clare_dv's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Grief, Pedophilia, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Death, Trafficking, Rape, Self harm, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Child abuse, and Police brutality

Moderate: Cancer, Kidnapping, Domestic abuse, and Deportation

brandiereadsbooks's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring tense medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Bullying, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Grief, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Trafficking, Emotional abuse, Abandonment, Chronic illness, Classism, Death, Pedophilia, and Rape

booktalkswithregina's review against another edition

dark reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

I always have a hard time rating memoirs. How to rate someone's life.
This is a story of overcoming the cruellest conditions. 
A story of survival and loss. Incredible pain and suffering, but also resilience and strength. I already knew a lot about North Korea, but this book still shocked me. Very hard to read and comprehend even.
After finishing, I was left amazed by the human capacity to overcome anything and everything.4

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Trafficking, Death, Death of parent, and Child abuse

Moderate: Torture

kirstenpod_'s review against another edition

emotional informative inspiring sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Trafficking, Domestic abuse, Kidnapping, Rape, Sexual assault, Death, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Suicidal thoughts, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Cancer and Terminal illness

Minor: Alcoholism and Genocide

ernie_8's review against another edition

dark emotional informative inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Violence, Child abuse, Blood, Classism, Death, Rape, Sexual violence, Trafficking, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Cancer and Confinement

Minor: Alcoholism and Abortion

ell_n's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring sad tense medium-paced

4.0

An incredible story, beautifully written 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Trafficking, Pedophilia, Self harm, Suicide, Death, Cancer, Rape, Abandonment, and Slavery

Moderate: War

graff_fuller's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense fast-paced

4.25

Do we ever really know why we pick up a book...and start reading it? Was it the cover? Was it the topic? Or could it be that we desire to know the story being told is going to TOUCH us...change the way we feel about [whatever the subject is]. 

I love biographies, but autobiographies are even better. "Straight from the horse's mouth", as they say.

The traumatic escape of Yeon-mi Park from N. Korea, to China, to Mongolia, to S. Korea, onward...to where she now lives in America.

The peak behind the curtain of what is actually going on in N. Korea is amazing (in a bad way). Also, to read about the propaganda machine that is at work in N. Korea...for 70+ years, so that not even S. Koreans know HOW different these two cultures are now.

To hear about empathy and love being devoid in the average N. Korean. Seeing public executions and dead people in the streets...as normal events. Being sold into slavery and prostitution, just to survive and escape...for slavery and prostitution are one thing, but HUNGER is worse. Anything, just to eat food.

None of us in the US can understand these things, which I'm glad for, but we need to educate ourselves. We do not agree with the leadership of N. Korea, but the people of N. Korea are enslaved, themselves to this dynasty and deserve our pity. The need to help other escape this hell hole...as Yeon-mi says, it is the DARKEST place on the earth. If you look at satellite photos of the area...there are very few lights, compared to the bordering countries...it looks like a black hole swallowed the entire country. Shortages of electricity, food, are necessities normal...and this is how the leadership keeps the people in check.

You really have to read it in her own words. She escaped when she was 13, but it wasn't until years later that she truly had freedom from the oppression that ALL people of N. Korea accept as NORMAL.

Share this story to your friends and family. It is a VERY sad tale, but she's come out of it, scars and all...and is trying to shine a light on N. Korea...so the world will come to its (the enslaved people who live in this country, under THIS regime) rescue.

I'm so happy that I picked this book up and read her story. There will be images that I won't be able to get out of my head, but maybe this will help people to help these downtrodden people.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual content, Violence, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Child abuse, Death, Trafficking, Bullying, Confinement, Death of parent, Deportation, Murder, Physical abuse, and Police brutality

writingcaia's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

5.0

There’s no right way to review such a memoir.
This is not a life many can ever relate to or even conceive off.
While I was reading I shared some sentences out loud to my partner and this comment he made was really poignant to my review of the book “if you ever heard the words poop thief in any other context (that wasn’t that of the memoir) you’d think people were joking.” Well, it was no joke in North Korea.
Another thing that really hit me hard is that when she finally reaches South Korea, after extreme poverty, famine, fear and repression (to say the least) in North Korea, naively being human trafficked to China, raped at 13, she starts reading a lot to try and catch up and it is then she realizes how limited her vocabulary was. Because, in North Korea the state wants you to live a small limited life, to be so naive as to never conceive of anything besides those teachings, but as she then learned new vocabulary she felt a new world had opened up, new feelings, new expression, new life, freedom.
It is not an easy read as you can tell by the hints I left behind so thread lightly if you’re easily triggered.
This was one of the most eye opening memoirs I’ve read, a reality I knew was bad transformed into something beyond comprehension, because even reading about it gives me only a glimpse of the horrific lives North Koreans are subject to. 
At such a young age Yeonmi is free, an example of fight, love, perseverance, and an advocate for her people. I truly hope she can also one day fulfil the promise she made her grandmother and father, and see her people free and an united Korea.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Child death, Slavery, and Trafficking

Moderate: Alcoholism, Suicide, Child abuse, and Rape

Famine