Sookann Character Summary

“Don’t stop for anything. Once you are on the other side of the fence, your will be in the South and you will be free. Maybe you mother is already there, waiting for her brave little ones.”

I like how the author adds into the dialogue that Sookan and Inchun are brave and that their mother may still alive to show to the reader that there is still hope for safety in the South and for their family.

The author’s style of writing, which is in the point of view of Sookan, helps understand the text better because Sookan is experiencing the many struggles of escapees from North Korea for a better life.

Judgments: In my opinion, the characters in the story are very believable. Through research, I found that the author, Sook Nyul Choi, was a North Korean refugee herself. Meaning that the author knows what it is like to escape to gain freedom in South Korea. The characters were also engaging to me because I liked their personalities. For example, Aunt Tiger lost a lot because of the Japanese, causing her to become bitter. She seems to be the only character that voices her opinion about the Japanese and Russians while everyone else keeps quiet out of fear.
The theme of family shows some insight of human nature because Sookan’s family seems to be experiencing lots of misfortune. At the beginning of the book, the father and brother are in a labor camp and the grandfather dies of some illness. Sookan, Inchun and their mother never get to see Kisa and Aunt Tiger after they leave because they were killed like the other traitors. As they are trying to get past Russian soldiers, Sookan and Inchun are separated from their mom. It is clearly shown that the family slowly gets separated but in the end, the parents and siblings are reunited and they are happy. Still, Sookan wonders about her other friends’