"In this rare insider's view into contemporary North Korea, a high-ranking counterintelligence agent describes his life as a former poet laureate to Kim Jong-il and his breathtaking escape to freedom. "The General will now enter the room." Everyone turns to stone. Not moving my head, I direct my eyes to a point halfway up the archway where Kim Jong-il's face will soon appear ... As North Korea's State Poet Laureate, Jang Jin-sung led a charmed life. With food provisions (even as the country suffered through its great famine), a travel pass, access to strictly censored information, and audiences with Kim Jong-il himself, his life in Pyongyang seemed safe and secure. But this privileged existence was about to be shattered. When a strictly forbidden magazine he lent to a friend goes missing, Jang Jin-sung must flee for his life. Never before has a member of the elite described the inner workings of this totalitarian state and its propaganda machine. An astonishing expose; told through the heart-stopping story of Jang Jin-sung's escape to South Korea, Dear Leader is a rare and unprecedented insight into the world's most secretive and repressive regime"-- Provided by publisher.

Includes index. Includes maps of: North Korea; Pyongyang.

pt. I. Dictator -- 1. Psychological warfare -- 2. Going home -- 3. My hometown transformed -- 4. The crime of peering over the border -- 5. A farewell sin -- 6. In the rifle sight -- pt. II. Fugitive -- 1. Yanbia looks to the world, the world to Yanbia! -- 2. Framed for murder -- 3. "Annals of the Kim Dynasty" -- 4. Criminal operations -- 5. North Korean women sold as "pigs" -- 6. At a loss -- 7. Farewell, Young-min -- pt. III. Freedom -- 1. From Yanji to Shenyang -- 2. A fateful meeting with Wang Cho-rin -- 3. Becoming a piano teacher -- 4. The Kim Jong-il strategy -- 5. Meeting Cho-rin's "intended" -- 6. A murderous regime -- 7. Long live freedom!