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Abe Lincoln Book Award 2021: Every Falling Star

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Every Falling Star: The True Story of How I Survived and Escaped North Korea

Every Falling Star: The True Story of How I Survived and Escaped North Korea by Sungju Lee

 

Every Falling Star, the first book to portray contemporary North Korea to a young audience, is the intense memoir of a North Korean boy named Sungju who is forced at age twelve to live on the streets and fend for himself. To survive, Sungju creates a gang and lives by thieving, fighting, begging, and stealing rides on cargo trains. Sungju richly re-creates his scabrous story, depicting what it was like for a boy alone to create a new family with his gang, his “brothers”; to be hungry and to fear arrest, imprisonment, and even execution. This riveting memoir allows young readers to learn about other cultures where freedoms they take for granted do not exist.

Sungju Lee Talks About Every Falling Star

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