Cullen Thomas

“Brother One Cell” is a story of a 20-something American guy travelling to South Korea in early 1990s in order to teach English. He then ends up caught trafficking drugs into Seoul from the Philippines and is sent to prison for 3,5 years. It is basically a story of the hardship of confinement, especially one away from home, in a totally strange culture, and of the struggle to come to terms with one’s mistakes. In all fairness to him, he seems to come to appreciate this hard lesson in the end and mature because of it. The book gives an interesting insight into Korean culture and traditions as well as into their prisons system which, according to the author, seems to make more sense than a lot of western culture jails. All in all, it’s a well written interesting story, worth a read.… (meer)

South Korea

Narratives of foreign incarceration stints typically combine complaints about the institutions inadequacy and sadism, sometimes coupled with self-reflection. Brother One Cell has both, with a believable progression from naivete to indignation to receptivity. Compared to Fellows's prison experience, Thomas's was fairly benign, though still awful in many ways. Though it moved slowly at times, it sustained my interest and I found Thomas's depiction of his own development convincing. Thomas's language is sometimes poetic and sometimes strained. I would have liked more about description of his decision to smuggle drugs into South Korea, and more explanation of the title (it commands only a few sentences). Thomas refers to Kang Chol Hwan's Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag, a North Korean prison narrative taking place on the other side of the not-too-distant border, and they would be interesting to read in tandem.

Listening to the audiobook version confirmed my extreme dislike for voice characterizations in non-fiction. Many of the accents attempted by the reader sounded similar, and those that didn't sounded like caricatures.… (meer)

Brother One Cell is more foreigner-in-Korea depravity, albeit in a lower form. Instead of outright murder, it's just smuggling two kilos of hashish into the country from the Philippines. No biggie. Of course, it doesn't help Thomas' story that he is, by all available accounts, a certifiable douche bag. I can't say that he's a bad writer, because he isn't, but his story does come off as something you'd like to know about, so long as someone else tells it. "Locked Up Abroad" movie-fied his story for those wanting the short version.… (meer)

An intimately and sensitively written story of 3.6 years imprisonment in South Korea. Among the obvious big lessons conveyed, there are so many little truths that rise out of this story and out of Thomas's accomplished writing, and those—along with the obvious hard work put into this book and his vivid and creative metaphors—rewarded me throughout. There is an urgency and immediacy that held me, and made me carry this awkward hardcover even on the crowded bus, elbowing others in order to keep turning pages. The research into the material is impressive and seamless, and while Thomas's Anglicized Hangul felt awkward at times, the integration of it worked well and was important.

A succinct passage in the very center of the book about a collection of moments seemed to me such an apt description of how the book is structured: 'Viewed as a whole, this journey is years, but I can see that it's really just a collection of moments: uncountable moments here, some joyful, others an awesome struggle, the same as everywhere. We really live only for a moment, but we can't see that when we stack together so many behind us, pile them up in front.' He writes without sentimentality (plus warts and all), though there is much sentiment in the writing and much sympathy for the characters—a very fine and difficult balance to achieve.

Part of what I connected to in this book is his ability to convey in Western terms so much of what it is about being Korean, along with universal truths about being simply human and showing clearly how those considered the bottom rungs of society are also us. This book's organic wholeness brings together so many opposing and extreme forces raised within the story, emotional, physical, conditional, familial, cultural, that it achieves as much an elusive and beautiful balance as does the taeguk of the Korean flag.… (meer)