Korean Literature

A New York Times Top 10 Book of the Year and National Book Award finalist, Pachinko is an "extraordinary epic" of four generations of a poor Korean immigrant family as they fight to control their destiny in 20th-century Japan (San Francisco Chronicle). In the early 1900s, teenaged Sunja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls for a wealthy stranger at the seashore near her home in Korea. He promises her the world, but when she discovers she is pregnant - and that her lover is married - she refuses to be bought.

Meet Casey Han: a strong-willed, Queens-bred daughter of Korean immigrants immersed in a glamorous Manhattan lifestyle she can't afford. Casey is eager to make it on her own, away from the judgements of her parents' tight-knit community, but she soon finds that her Princeton economics degree isn't enough to rid her of ever-growing credit-card debt and a toxic boyfriend. When a chance encounter with an old friend lands her a new opportunity, she's determined to carve a space for herself in a glittering world of privilege, power, and wealth—but at what cost?

The 2020 Commission Report on the North Korean Nuclear Attacks Against the United States is an exciting piece of "speculative fiction." The novel posits that there was a nuclear attack against the US on March 21, 2020 by North Korea, and that a national bipartisan commission was created to investigate what and how it happened. It's pretty scary stuff.

Amoral, cunning, ruthless, and instructive, this piercing work distills 3,000 years of the history of power into 48 well-explicated laws. This bold volume outlines the laws of power in their unvarnished essence, synthesizing the philosophies of Machiavelli, Sun Tzu, Carl von Clausewitz, and other infamous strategists. The 48 Laws of Power will fascinate any listener interested in gaining, observing, or defending against ultimate control.

Often considered the highest achievement in Korean fiction, The Nine Cloud Dream poses the question: Will the life we dream of truly make us happy? Written in 17th-century Korea, this classic novel's wondrous story begins when a young monk living on a sacred Lotus Peak in China succumbs to the temptation of eight fairy maidens. For doubting his master's Buddhist teachings, the monk is forced to endure a strange punishment: reincarnation as the most ideal of men.

Helena Rho was six years old when her family left Seoul, Korea, for America and its opportunities. Years later, her Korean-ness behind her, Helena had everything a model minority was supposed to want: she was married to a white American doctor and had a beautiful home, two children, and a career as an assistant professor of pediatrics. For decades she fulfilled the expectations of others. All the while Helena kept silent about the traumas - both professional and personal - that left her anxious yet determined to escape.

Maya loves to cook with her grandmother - her Halmunee - to connect with the rich family history associated with each dish, a history Maya's mom would prefer stayed in the past. While cooking with Halmunee, something remarkable happens - the food creates such a strong memory that Maya and Halmunee are transported back in time through the memory itself. Halmunee explains that the women in her family have the gift of time travel through food and Maya can do it too, if she practices.

Battlefield Korea picks up in the middle of a brewing global conflict, as the Chinese look to capitalize on Russian intervention in the Ukrainian civil war. The surprise attack there has NATO in chaos, false headlines barrage the Internet, and the war in Ukraine seems all but lost. Will this distraction keep America from intervening in Asia? When the Chinese begin to provide the North Korean regime with additional fuel, hard currency, and weapons, will America still be able to honor its treaty obligations in Asia?

In the aftermath of World War II, Goh Junja is a girl just coming into her own. She is the latest successful deep-sea diver in her family. She urges her mother to allow her to make their annual trip to Mt. Halla, where they trade sea delicacies for pork. A sea-village girl, Junja has never been to the mountains, where it smells like mushrooms and earth, and it is there she falls in love with mountain-boy Yang Suwol. But when Junja returns one day later, it is just in time to see her mother take her last breath, beaten by the waves during a dive she was taking in Junja's place.

In 1917, deep in the snowy mountains of occupied Korea, an impoverished local hunter on the brink of starvation saves a young Japanese officer from an attacking tiger. In an instant, their fates are connected — and from this encounter unfolds a saga that spans half a century.

A woman meets her next-door neighbor and loans her a spatula, then starts suffering horrific gaps in her memory. A man, feeling jilted by an unrequited love, becomes obsessed with sorting through his neighbors' garbage in the belief that it will teach him how to better relate to people. A landlord decides to raise the rent, and his tenants hatch a plan to kill him at a team-building retreat. In 10 captivating, unnerving stories, Flowers of Mold presents a range of ordinary individuals who have found themselves left behind by an increasingly urbanized and fragmented world.

In 1948, Najin and Calvin Cho, with their young daughter Miran, travel from South Korea to the United States in search of new opportunities. Wary of the challenges they know will face them, Najin and Calvin make the difficult decision to leave their other daughter, Inja, behind with their extended family; soon, they hope, they will return to her. But then war breaks out in Korea, and there is no end in sight to the separation. Miran grows up in prosperous American suburbia as Inja grapples in her war-torn land with ties to a family she doesn't remember.

1999: The Kim family is struggling to move on after their mother, Sunny, vanished a year ago. Sixty-one-year-old John Kim feels more isolated from his grown children than ever before. But one evening, their fragile lives are further upended when John finds the body of a stranger in the backyard, carrying a letter to Sunny, leaving the family with more questions than ever.

The Accusation is a deeply moving and eye-opening work of fiction that paints a powerful portrait of life under the North Korean regime. Set during the period of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il's leadership, the seven stories that make up The Accusation give voice to people living under this most bizarre and horrifying of dictatorships. The characters of these compelling stories come from a wide variety of backgrounds.

Tree-ear is an orphan boy in a 12th-century Korean potters’ village. When he accidentally breaks a pot, he must work for the master to pay for the damage by setting off on a difficult and dangerous journey that will change his life forever.

When the Seoul police inform Min that his girlfriend Yu-jin has committed suicide, he’s sure it can't be true. She was successful, ambitious, happy, just on the cusp of graduating from university and claiming the future she’d always dreamed of.

Deadly storms have ravaged Mina’s homeland for generations. Floods sweep away entire villages, while bloody wars are waged over the few remaining resources. Her people believe the Sea God, once their protector, now curses them with death and despair. In an attempt to appease him, each year a beautiful maiden is thrown into the sea to serve as the Sea God’s bride, in the hopes that one day the “true bride” will be chosen and end the suffering.

A small island off the coast of Korea is torn apart by a bioweapon that drives everyone - men, women, and children - insane with murderous rage. The people behind the attack want Korea reunified or destroyed. No middle ground. No mercy. Soon Japan, China, and the United States are pushed to the brink of war, while terrorists threaten to release the rage bioweapon in a way of pure destructive slaughter.

Riley Oh can't wait to see her sister get initiated into the Gom clan, a powerful lineage of Korean healing witches their family has belonged to for generations. Her sister, Hattie, will earn her Gi bracelet and finally be able to cast spells without adult supervision. Although Riley is desperate to follow in her sister's footsteps when she herself turns 13, she's a saram - a person without magic. Riley was adopted, and despite having memorized every healing spell she's ever heard, she often feels like the odd one out in her family and the gifted community.

An excellent student from a poor, traditional family in Seoul, the narrator has absorbed the same message her whole life: Only a boy can provide the family with dignity and wealth. Not her. Not her three sisters. Receiving approval only for uncomplaining sacrifice, she has resolved to take on her family’s troubles. She is a good girl. And she knows what good girls must do.