Goodreads All Sorts discussion

We started this book this month.. I am playing catching but with a busy weekend.. Still got the first 100 pages and overwhelmed with so many ideas at the moment.

1 Is there any truth to the Americanized version of life in NK.
2 Even if there is not, does it really matter to the story Adam Johnson is trying to tell.
3 How much of of my western centric view of the world affect what I am reading..

I spent the night at ballgame, then watching a Major sport boxing fight and drinking a tad too much. By the end of the night was having a one side conversation with a racist who did not see he was one and felt that raising his voice was the equal of presenting facts. I found it sad, but also eye opening that I had sheltered myself from such hatred that is alive in our modern world.

I feel if I am going to enjoy this books I need to read it from many points of view.

Michael, I had somewhat similar questions as I read the book. Specially one question was always at the background: the incidents narrated in the novel are true or not? If true, how far are they true? Or are there exaggerations? Moreover the first 80 pages seemed to me a very lengthy narration of few incidents that could have been very well narrated in 30 or 40 pages. Hope it gets better.

Dhanaraj. I have come to the conclusion I enjoyed the first half much more. I liked the pacing, it may have stretched out the story, but that seems more believable. A bit more personal. Our protagonist life is being built and I see a man of the state. A man who hardship are not so far fetched. A man who was broken in to doing what was he was told. I am not at all sure we should like him. But I found I did. Much as latter in the book when they are watching Casablanca and Sun Moon states. (spoiler warning)


“I have to get out of this land and make it to a place where real acting exists. I need a letter of transit and you must help me. Not because you killed my husband or because we will pay the price when the Dear Leader casts you aside, but because you are like Rick. You are an honorable man like Rick in the movie.”


Ironically the previous statement if from the half of the book that the characters have moved to comic version of themselves. Still I am enjoying a well written story.

Michael, You are fast. Or we can say that I was caught up in some assignments. The next week is free and I might finish in the next week. I will tell of my opinions later.

I finished the book today. And Michael I like to say that I loved the second part better. It was better developed and the literary technique of triple narration was good. The first part made a reader to realise that a person was made by state. And the second part was intended to show that a man when he decides on his own in a totalitarian state the result would be terrible.
At the end of it all, it was worth a reading.

Dhanaraj wrote: "I finished the book today. And Michael I like to say that I loved the second part better. It was better developed and the literary technique of triple narration was good. The first part made a read..."

I am glad we read this book. And to find that we both found worth in different parts is what makes reading books so great.

I agree with your opinion. It was a good book and both of us liked it for different reasons. Reading is always a mystery relating much to subjectivity of a person.