Thanks. :) It was the right choice. :)

Me too. She’s wonderful.

Yes. This and 9/11 week.

Quit my job today. I don’t even care any more.

Is it bad that I’m dying to know who this guy is? Did you save his number or anything?

At 26, it meant “I’ll share my blow with you.”

tl;dr

They’re the ones who think it’s a good idea to take out a home equity loan to remodel their kitchen again. Assholes.

Millennial. 100%

You’re a millennial, dude. I suppose we can make an exception for you if you’re old enough to remember the card catalog, phone books, the Oregon Trail, and checking the mail.

Yeah, in theory they’d like to “work” in public service, until they realize work requires doing more than clicking Like on Facebook. Then they get all crampy and try to start a revolution...

You’re awesome, Mat.

I’m lost anymore — commented all over this thread at this point — so probably can’t clarify much.

There’s nothing undercover about it, other than she lied about being a journalist to gain entry to NK, and lied to her employer, claiming to be an evangelical Christian so she could have a job in Pyongyang. Once in NK, she scarcely bothers to maintain either charade.

She bemoans a nameless unrequited love in Brooklyn while flirting with students. She gets bored. She describes ramen. She gets bored some more.

You come close. Read the book, then let me know what you think.

How many white male authors of books about North Korea can you name? Clearly their faces aren’t plastered everywhere.

She wanted it labeled investigative journalism, but it was neither. It was a whiny tale of a year of boredom in North Korea. She did no research, broke no stories, and reported on nothing other than her feelings.

Nothing to Envy is fiction. Fictionalized accounts of defectors’ stories? The only bigger waste of time is Holocaust fiction.

Curious to know if the author of this piece deigned to actually read the book. It *is* a memoir, and hardly journalism....unless you count Kim’s pages upon pages of lusting over an unrequited love in the states and flirting with with NK students to be journalism.