Two orphan girls are taken from their jobs in a pants factory in North Korea, spirited across the Demilitarized Zone to be sex workers in the South, and eventually shipped to the United States. What propels the story is Gi, the heroine: a tender-hearted genius who loses everything yet refuses to be destroyed.

Reminiscent of Memoirs of a Geisha, All Woman and Springtime reveals with chilling accuracy life behind North Korea's iron curtain, the horrific underworld of the sex trade, and the resilience of a spirit in the midst of unspeakable oppression.