Korean Archives - BookDragon

The Hard Road Out: One Woman’s Escape from North Korea by Jihyun Park and Seh-lynn Chai, translated by Sarah Baldwin-Beneich [in Booklist]

24 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Korean, Memoir, Nonfiction, North Korean, Repost, Translation

Jihyun Park is a twice-escaped defector. Seh-lynn Chai is initially her hired English translator, then her friend, even sister. “Jihyun is from the North and I am from the South,” Chai writes, “but we share a single identity: we’re both Korean.” At their 2014 first...

I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Sehee, translated by Anton Hur [in Booklist]

07 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Korean, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost, Translation

The cover boasts a recommendation from global phenom BTS’s leader RM. The PR materials tout its “runaway best-seller” status in its native South Korea, where mental illness remains stigmatized in a country with one of the world’s highest suicide rates. As a twentysomething social media director...

Saha by Cho Nam-Joo, translated by Jamie Chang [in Booklist]

05 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Town was once a fish-farm village, but it’s now internationally known for the corporation that aggressively expanded it into a bustling city-state. Here, class stratification is impermeable. Su is a Citizen. Do-kyung is a Saha, an inconsequential resident of the crumbling Saha Estates who...

Artist by Yeong-shin Ma, translated by Janet Hong [in Booklist]

15 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Yeong-shin Ma’s dazzling 2020 English debut, Moms, won the 2021 Harvey Award for Best International Book and has recently been picked up for a TV series. Fortuitously paired again with award-winning Korean Canadian translator Janet Hong, Ma’s spectacular latest import arrives in brilliant full...

The Pachinko Parlor by Elisa Shua Dusapin, translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins [in Shelf Awareness]

07 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, French, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Winter in Sokcho, the extraordinary first novel, gorgeously translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins, by French Korean author Elisa Shua Dusapin, won the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature. The two reunite for The Pachinko Parlor, in which Dusapin's remarkably intricate and lean prose reveals...

The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh [in School Library Journal]

24 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Axie Oh adapts the traditional Korean “Tale of Shim Cheong” as the basis of her latest novel, her first foray into exploring folklore. Her unique version features 16-year-old Mina who, unwilling to watch her adored older brother lose his beloved Shim Cheong, replaces herself as...

The Age of Doubt by Pak Kyongni, translated by Sophie Bowman and others [in Booklist]

06 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Short Stories, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Considered one of Korea’s greatest novelists, Pak Kyongni (1926-2008) is revered for her multi-volume epic Toji (The Land, 1969-1994), designated among the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works. She began publishing autobiographical short stories, inspired by tragic post-Korean War experiences, exposing the high cost of survival,...

Broken Summer by J. M. Lee, translated by An Seon Jae [in Booklist]

05 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

Bestselling Korean author J.M. Lee (The Boy Who Escaped Paradise, 2016) deftly unwinds another intricately plotted narrative, his third English translation available Stateside, this time ciphered by An Seon Jae, the British-born, naturalized Korean octogenarian scholar-teacher better known as Brother Anthony. At 43, artist Hanjo has...

Concerning My Daughter by Kim Hye-jin, translated by Jamie Chang [in Booklist]

29 Aug, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Already a prestigious bestseller in Korea, Kim Hye-jin’s impassioned novel about the meaning of family – by blood, by choice – marks her English-language debut, seamlessly translated by National Book Award longlister Jamie Chang. A mother is desperate to help her thirtysomething daughter, an...

Flip the Script by Lyla Lee [in Shelf Awareness]

20 Jun, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Readers familiar with Lyla Lee's exuberant YA debut, I'll Be the One, will be tickled to see that singer/dancer Skye Shin is "topping the charts" in Lee's equally ebullient sophomore YA novel, Flip the Script. Like Skye, Lee's new protagonist, Hana Jin, is a Korean American...

The Old Woman with the Knife by Gu Byeong-Mo, translated by Chi-Young Kim [in Booklist]

17 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

Once upon a time, Hornclaw had a family...

The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart by Chesil, translated by Takami Nieda [in Shelf Awareness]

28 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Debut author Chesil commemorated the end of her 20s by writing a novel based on her childhood experiences. The result, The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart, is a literary triumph that's both outstanding storytelling and searing societal commentary. "High school was...

The Depth of the Lake and the Height of the Sky by Kim Jihyun [in Shelf Awareness]

31 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Korean, Repost

More than a foot tall and nine inches wide, the exquisite The Depth of the Lake and the Height of the Sky, by Korean author/illustrator Kim Jihyun, makes a magnificent first impression. The pages within showcase spectacular illustrations and, without a single word, gorgeously reveal a...

Star Fishing by Sang-Keun Kim, translated by Ginger Ly [in Shelf Awareness]

01 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Delight sparkles throughout Sang-Keun Kim's Star Fishing, a picture book import from South Korea smoothly translated by Ginger Ly. A bunny-suit-clad child, wide awake in a shadowy bedroom, reveals, "It's the kind of night when you just can't fall asleep. You feel as though everyone...

Violets by Kyung-sook Shin, translated by Anton Hur [in Booklist]

24 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Mention of Wim Wenders’ Buena Vista Social Club sets this novel in 1999, when Oh San turns 23 that summer. She left her childhood village years ago, haunted by the memory of a best friendship’s wrenching cleaving. After being repeatedly abandoned by her mother,...

The Red Palace by June Hur [in Shelf Awareness]

07 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Canadian Asian Pacific American, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Repost, Young Adult Readers

June Hur's self-described "obsessing over books about Joseon Korea" has made her a critically acclaimed author of historical Korean fiction. She follows The Silence of Bones and The Forest of Stolen Girls with another riveting thriller, The Red Palace, which transports readers to 1758 Hanyang (now Seoul), when murder...

Seoulmates by Jen Frederick [in Shelf Awareness]

26 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Korean American, Repost

Since Hara Wilson and Choi Yujun didn't quite get their happily-ever-after in Heart & Seoul, author Jen Frederick – a transracial Korean adoptee – returns with its addictive sequel, Seoulmates. In the first book, Korea-born, Iowa-raised adoptee Hara's loss of her estranged father prompted a...

It’s OK, Slow Lizard by Yeorim Yoon, illustrated by Jian Kim, translated by Chi-Young Kim [in Shelf Awareness]

11 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW Author Yeorim Yoon invites readers into a welcoming haven in the Korean import It's OK, Slow Lizard, gorgeously illustrated by Jian Kim. In an idyllic forest live five wonderful friends: Little Bird, Elephant, Rabbit, Monkey, and Slow Lizard. Basking in gentle sunlight, Slow Lizard enjoys...

Himawari House by Harmony Becker [in Booklist]

23 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Hapa/Mixed-race, Japanese, Japanese American, Korean, Repost, Singaporean, Young Adult Readers

*STARRED REVIEW Harmony Becker, who brilliantly created the artwork for George Takei’s Eisner-winning They Called Us Enemy (2019), makes her stupendous solo debut in what will prove to one of the best graphic titles of the year. The narrative might initially seem simple: a mixed-race U.S. teen...

Love in the Big City by Sang Young Park, translated by Anton Hur [in Booklist]

20 Sep, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Korean, Repost, Translation

In the “big city” of Seoul, love isn’t easy to find – even tougher to secure is love that lasts. Young and Jaehee are best friends from university, bonded in their “boundless energy of [being] poor, promiscuous twenty-year-olds.” Young is a gay man, Jaehee a straight...

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