Ann Shin is a Canadian author of Korean heritage, and she has crafted this illuminating novel from interviews with North Korean defectors, who she met for her documentary, The Defector: Escape from North Korea which won Best Documentary and Best Documentary Director at the 2014 Canadian Screen Academy. The Last Exiles won the 2022 Trillium Award.

The blurber makes elements of it sound a bit like a slushy romance, but it's much better than that.

I haven't read much from Korea, but one book that has stayed with me is The Accusation, Forbidden Stories from inside North Korea. It is samizdat literature, smuggled out of North Korea, and published for safety's sake under the nom de plume Bandi and translated by Deborah Smith. In my review you can read how a series of short stories illuminated the poverty, the repression and the methods of social control under North Korea's oppressive and cruel regime. The Last Exiles is written from the safety of Canada, but one can only admire the courage of the defectors who provided the information for Ann Shin to write her story.

In a corrupt society there are always those who are better off than others, and in The Last Exiles Jin is only able to meet the wealthy Suja at university because he's a brilliant student who has won a scholarship. His poverty is obvious to all, and he has to endure derogatory remarks from his fellow students about his clothes, his accent and his rural origins. Despite these social differences their love blossoms and Jin has dreams of one day being able to impress her family by being presented to the 'Dear Leader' as a scholar. Both of these young people have no idea about the real world because of the tightly censored information machine, and they are, for different reasons, loyal to the regime. Jin is grateful for his scholarship benefits which enable him to transcend his family's poverty (and send extra rations back home) while Suja's family owes its wealth and privilege to its role in the media, and Suja is bypassing 'official' channels to further her future career as a photojournalist.

The catalyst for the disaster that befalls them both is Jin's visit to his home village. He is horrified by the effects of the famine on his family, made worse by his father's principled refusal to supplement their meagre diet with black market goods. When soldiers ransack the village Jin impulsively sets off to report the crime, but inadvertently ends up with a bag of stolen cornmeal. A jealous neighbour informs the authorities and after a brutal beating he ends up in prison where he used as slave labour.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2022/11/18/the-last-exiles-by-ann-shin/ (Please note there are some spoilers.) ( )

An unflinching look at North Korea under the devastating dictatorship of Kim Jong-il. Told through the trials of two college students, young and in love, who find themselves in dire straits.

Hard to read at times. Sad. Devastating. But proves that love, and a little bit of hope, are all a person needs to survive.

Definitely a must read as a modern day historical lesson. Four stars rather than five solely due to wishing there was an afterward that went into more historical detail and/or explained the research that went into the book. ( )

Shin, an Oscar-nominated filmmaker, makes her debut in fiction by giving readers a glimpse of life in North Korea. Focusing on the romance between a girl whose father works for the government newspaper and a young boy who is thrown into prison for stealing cornmeal for his starving family. Jin, the young man escapes and Suja is determined to find him. Shin, whose previous films have documented the hardships and the price North Koreans have to pay so they can escape gives credence to this bleak and fast-paced story. ( )