"But this was how Jun Do, at fourteen, became a tunnel soldier, trained in the art of zero-light combat" (Part One, p. 9).

"Jun Do never looked. He knew the televisions were huge and there was all the rice you could eat. Yet he wanted no part of it— he was scared that if he saw it with his own eyes, his entire life would mean nothing" (Part One, p. 22).

"It struck Jun Do that one day men had come for his mother like this, that he was now one of those men" (Part One, p. 23).

"'The world thinks I'm an orphan, that's my curse,' Jun Do told him. 'But how did a Pyongyang boy like you end up doing such shitty jobs"' (Part One, p. 28).

"Jun Do had dealt with this his whole life, the ways it was impossible for people from normal families to...