Books - A River in Darkness by Masaji Ishikawa

A River in Darkness: One Man's Escape from North Korea by Masaji Ishikawa
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"A River in Darkness" chronicles the author's, Masaji Ishikawa, journey as a kid in Japan, his family's move to North Korea following the Korean War, his experiences in North Korea, and his eventual escape. Ishikawa, born in Japan to a Korean father and Japanese mother, is moved by his father to North Korea after the Korean War, due in significant part to the promises of prosperity, education, and a better life promoted by North Korean propaganda. The move is made for many reasons, but includes the racism and discrimination that the author's father faced in Japan.

Ishikawa then shares his story of growing up in extreme poverty in North Korea, his maturation from a teenage boy to a young man and eventually a husband and father himself. Through it all, Ishikawa does not spare his reader. The abject conditions, the incredible steps taken just to survive (boiling weeds for dinner), the pain, hardship, and death that occurs all around him are shared with the reader.

Anyone who has read Elie Wiesel's "Night" will see and feel similarities. It's writing is intimate, personal, and intense. There is pain and suffering, and the existential crises such experiences often cause. While there is hope - we know he escapes because he wrote the book (as we knew Wiesel survived the Nazi concentration camps because he wrote a book) - the book is mostly tragedy.

While the book chronicles experiences that primarily took place from the 1960s through the mid 1990s, in light of current events, it seems particularly relevant. With so little known about North Korea, and the rise of strongman politicians around the world, "A River in Darkness," much light "Night," serves as a cautionary tale and a warning of what will result when evil persists.

View all my reviews