North Korea: Like Nowhere Else - Two Years of Living in the World's Most Secretive State

by Lindsey Miller

The first photographic exploration from a Westerner living and travelling in North Korea for two years.
What happens when you travel to a place where even basic truths are ambiguous? Where sometimes you can’t trust your own eyes or feelings? Where the divide between real and imagined is never clear?
For two years, Lindsey Miller lived in North Korea, long regarded as one of the most closed societies on earth. As one of Pyongyang’s small community of resident foreigners, Lindsey was granted remarkable freedoms to experience the country without government minders. She had a front row seat as North Korea shot into the headlines during an unprecedented period of military tension with the US and the subsequent historic Singapore Summit.
However, it was the connection with individuals and their families, and the day-to-day reality of control and repression, that delivered the real revelations of North Korean life, and which left Lindsey utterly changed from the woman who had nervously disembarked from her plane onto an empty runway just two years before.
This is her extraordinary photographic account, a testament to the hidden humanity of North Korea.

Genres: Nonfiction, Photography, Travel

224 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 6, 2021

About the author

Lindsey Miller is a musical director and award-winning composer. For the last ten years, she has worked in theatres across the UK, Europe, North America and Asia and has most recently worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company. During 2017–19, Lindsey lived in Pyongyang, North Korea, while accompanying her husband on a diplomatic posting. Lindsey is from Glasgow, Scotland. She now lives in Kent. North Korea: Like Nowhere Else is her first book.

Reviews

[Jake Chaplin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this up as an impulse buy, and I'm so glad that I did.

North Korea, the most secretive nation in the world, finally brought to life by the art of photography. It really shows the humanity behind every day life. Of course, it's still controversial, and this book does confront some of that, however, it's more a celebration of the beauty of the mundane, ordinary things in life.

You often forget that the people of North Korea are still human. This book celebrates some of that humanity and beauty.

[A.H. Wang · Rating 5 out of 5]

This little gem of a book is like nothing else out there, a humane look at a country that is so isolated and inaccessible to the rest of the world. The photographs and the stories are honest and evocative, and you really feel like the author has made an effort to make a connection and understand the people in North Korea, rather than delivering the stock-standard western view of the totalitarian regime. Highly recommended.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very unique and moving insight into North Korea from someone who spent their time in amongst the people (as much as was possible to do so). Beautiful, honest pictures taken from the point of view of a woman trying to understand both the joys and restrictions of being a North Korean. Lindsey’s writing is evocative and moving and I would recommend this book to anyone- to challenge our assumptions and gain a wider understanding of this mysterious country.

[Chelsea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Continuing my North Korea investigation. The author, British photographer Lindsey Miller, lived in the reclusive country for 2 years, photographing and journaling. Always wary of her as a foreigner, though inquisitive, ordinary Koreans occasionally interact and those experiences are recounted. Mostly a book of photos with explanations and snippets of life. I loved the way Miller showed the joy, mundanity, and daily struggles with weather/traffic/etc. —all part of the human experience but also the fascinating and exceptional nature of the lived experience in North Korea: the repression, fear, and inequality of wealth distribution.

[Joanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

North Korea Like Nowhere Else is a photographic exploration of the life in North Korea from the unique perspective of the Westerner living in the capital city of Pyongyang between 2017 and 2019.

Through a series of evocative as well as informative stories, anecdotes and captivating photos accompanied by the author’s very sensitive, insightful and respectful observations of people, their interactions and emotions, the reader is offered a glimpse into the everyday life of the North Koreans who have now lived under one of the most oppressive totalitarian communist regimes for many decades. The author, Lindsey Miller, is unbelievably emphatic, aware, humble, responsible and respectful observer of everyday life in North Korea.

This is not a book on geopolitics, but rather an attempt to present the humanity of the (North) Korean people. This book is a very touching and so badly needed tribute to the people of North Korea.

I must say that I have been deeply moved by the narrative and photos of this book. I was born in Eastern Europe during the time of the communist regime, in many aspects resembling the one in North Korea, especially when it comes to people’s behaviour. Many countries of Eastern Europe are now democratic but it took many decades for them to recover and that past seems like science-fiction.

Reading North Korea Like Nowhere Else really made my heart heavy with sorrow. I do hope that in my lifetime I will see people of North Korea enjoying basic freedoms that most of us have the access to.

I can’t recommend this book highly enough. I would like to thank September Publishing for this wonderful gifted copy which I will definitely cherish for a long time and thank you for publishing this beautiful book with focus on North Korea. I am in awe of this publication.

[Tarun · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great and different.

It’s a very light read but very different than most of what you read about North Korea. Much has been said about how terrible the regime is and how oppressed the people are; at the same time that often leads to harrowing stories that often pretty similar.

This book is a different take: it’s not a defector’s story or someone on a guided tour but really captures what it is like to live there as a privileged foreigner, something very few people will ever experience—and does so in pictures.

Lindsay has no illusions about North Korea and openly shares the oppression she sees all around her, however, the book is really about how she was able, in small pockets, to connect to the people around her and capture, to the extent anyone can, what North Korea looks like beyond the extremes. North Koreans are forced to live in a giant prison, but Lindsay really does capture the small sliver of humanity and normalcy that exists in one of the worst’s places on earth.

[Chris Aylott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nothing earth-shattering here, which is I suppose the point. Miller's pictures show the ordinariness of life in North Korea, which is a useful thing to remember as we grapple with the ongoing problem of its vicious, criminal leadership. It's easy to feel Miller's frustration as she never really knows how much of her relationships with people and what they tell her is true, but she chooses to believe in their humanity and there's a lot to be said for that.

One thing that always puzzles me is how empty pictures of Pyongyang and other urban areas of North Korea tend to look. I always wonder if most people are staying out of the field of the camera or if there are just that few people relative to the infrastructure.

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

At this point I've read ~15-20 books about North Korea, and usually the lower end of the hierarchy includes those written by westerners who visited the hermit kingdom. However, this was a surprisingly impressive collection of photographs and anecdotes over two years; the photos really drove home both the humanity and the natural beauty within the DPRK. The narrative jumps around at random and frankly acknowledges that relationships and experiences as a foreigner within North Korea can only go so deep. This refreshingly avoids the pitfalls that other authors who visited Pyongyang have succumbed to, like tangents about getting homesick.

As a side note, this was my first experience ever using interlibrary loan, so thank you to the "Sno-Isle Libraries" system in Washington state for sharing.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully written. I love the honest account of her time in North Korea without the unnecessary history of North Korea that other writers tend to infuse into their book. This book is concise and the photographs are carefully selected to reflect the everyday lives of the people where photography is somewhat permitted or secretly permitted. Probably one of the better books on North Korea than others out there (if you want read from a perspective of a visitor than an an academic writer).

[Lyset · Rating 4 out of 5]

圖文並茂的緣故，三個小時讀完本書，總體還算不錯。作者琳賽•米勒曾經以英國駐朝鮮大使館外交官家屬的身份隨同其丈夫在朝鮮住了兩年。這本書就是她觀察朝鮮普通民眾的見聞錄。與一般揭露朝鮮政治的文學作品不同，賽琳這本書更貼近普通人的日常生活——這也打破了很多人對朝鮮的刻板認知。書中令人印象最深的有以下幾件事：在朝鮮開車路過金氏家族巨型畫像時必須要將車速減緩；並不是每一個朝鮮人都對政府宣傳狂熱到手舞足蹈，搖旗吶喊的。人群中有人高聲歡呼，也有人默默離開，這是截然不同的精神狀態。你所看見的，可能只是演戲罷了；朝鮮人也渴望外界訊息；在朝鮮，普通人不被過多允許與外國人接觸，不知道哪裡就藏著個特務暗中偷聽對話，所以大多數朝鮮人不敢說心裡話，這也是作者在書中認為最遺憾的一個方面，即永遠無法挖掘朝鮮民眾內心真實所想。

[Ryan_hg · Rating 4 out of 5]

A photographic book of how North Korea looks like. Author have added in her own perspective during her years in North Korea. This book served like a Nat Geo documentary in writings and nicely taken photographs

[Cherub · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.8/5

[Katherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some interesting vignettes and photos that would be boring if taken anywhere else.