Current Obsessions

This year I've started out with a highly unusual trend.  I haven't read a single piece of fiction thus far.  I'm not sure why I haven't ventured far into the world of nonfiction before.  I was an English Literature major in college, so Victorian novels have always appealed to me much more.  This trend started with book club in January when the suggested book for February was Nothing to Envy, which is a book about people who have escaped (and survived) from North Korea.

This may come across the wrong way, but when I was 22, I was filling out mission papers and trying to decide what to do with my life.  I had this overwhelming fear that I would get sent to Korea if I went.  I also decided that I would be angry if I wasn't sent to a Spanish speaking country due to my family's background.  So I moved to San Francisco and threw away the papers and never learned Korean or Spanish.  The whole point of this tangent is to say that I used to be afraid of Asia in general and their food and this book only confirmed my fears.  People.  North Korea is scary and their food is non-existent.  I couldn't put the book down.  Being able to read about a country that is so closed from people who grew up there is pretty awesome.  If you have any interest in North Korea, check out this book.

The week I finished the North Korea book, I was pretty sick and stayed home for 3 days from work.  To pass the time I ended up watching the first two seasons of Sisterwives on TLC.  Watching a family with a culture so similar to my own was very eerie and kind of freaked me out.  Later in the week I had some friends over to watch a movie and I fessed up to watching this ridiculous polygamist show.  Turns out my friends were fairly knowledgeable about the subject and thus we started an underground Polygamist Book Club.  So I read 2 books on the subject: Stolen Innocence and Love Times Three.  For almost a week straight I had dreams that I was a polygamist.  Remember that time that I was a polygamist? 

I am definitely ready for a break from stories involving people being trapped by a culture that involves abuse.  Sheesh.

And in case you want to know more about either of these things, here are some videos that I have watched more than once now.

• Inside North Korea part 1, 2, and 3
• A guy who was born in a labor camp in North Korea
• Did you know that there is a polygamist sect in Bountiful, British Columbia?
• Some very attractive polygamists

The devil's twins: