Esther Yi

A Novel

Helen 

“I don't know what to do with the rest of the day" I said. I go home, and then what. What do I do with all that time ahead of me. But there's also not enough time. For what, I don't know."

 "It's simple," Lise said. "You find the people you love and follow them to the ends of the earth. Nothing else matters.

If most people looked for someone to love, she, like a tax collector, looked for those who failed to love her and made them pay up.

Kat Albanese

Strange how it was only when she lost her grip on the most quotidian facts, that she remembered the one thing she had spent her entire life trying to forget.

who told me to read this. we need to talk.

baku

Gelaine Trinidad

4.25/5 

for my unhinged fellow kpop stans interested in the notion of parasocial relationships in kpop culture, as well as fans of literary fiction (Bunny by Mona Awad comes to mind) with a hint of existentialism and spiritual philosophy. 

a blast fever dream read.

On a sentence level this just was way too hard for my noodle — DNF

Margo Koss

Pretty fucking exhausting to read but at least it was interesting?

Regan Martin

Pretty fucking exhausting to read but at least it was interesting?



i feel like ppl only tell other ppl to read this for the shock value, not bc it's actually any good. read an interview w the author where she was explicit abt this not being a story about kpop or fandom at all, to which i absolutely agree — the mc (who is appropriately never named) does not behave or speak like a kpop fan, and the ties to kpop in the book are tenuous. instead, it's far more about identity, knowing oneself (and whether or not it is even possible to know one's self), perceptions of someone vs the reality of someone, and losing yourself in the search for real humanity/human connection, which may or may not exist. that being said, i think it is largely discussed as a book abt kpop and fandom, which to me is kind of uh not good in the sense that the author did not have any intention to critique or explore kpop fandoms in writing this, so her work should not be used to do so. like hello this woman clearly does not know abt kpop at all just from the way she writes abt it lol. i thought the interview i read was funny in the sense that yi clearly knew what she was wanting to convey to the extent that she was correcting the interviewer's perceptions of the novel, and i could absolutely see the points she was correcting the interviewer on, but i also think this novel is deeply misunderstood (as evidenced by it being marketed as a kpop + fandom related novel despite it not actually being a kpop + fandom related novel) and that incident is just proof of such. i myself definitely did not understand what was going on most of the time (aside from the fact that i simply did not have the brain capacity or willingness to dissect the meaning of each scene, i also listened to this on audiobook while i was packing to move, so i was a liiiittle distracted), and i'm not going to lie to you, i'm not sure if i have any interest in understanding it further. glad i kinda skimmed the audiobook just to know wtf is going on in public discourse, but that's about it. 

i will say i thought the book came most alive in the y/n story that the mc was writing, and i was most interested in what was going on during mc and moon's final interaction. i thought there were threads here that could have been interesting to explore — specifically the idea of crafting a story to be together in this life and the next and the blurring of reality to the point where mc seems to genuinely think her story is real — but again, not in the sense of like, "this means fandom and y/n fic is bad bc ppl clearly think it's real!" (bc again, it's clear from the way she talks abt the story that she's not rly a fan) but in the sense of like, "this is a plot point that makes sense to me and i can follow the thread of it and see that it's pushing the story forward to go somewhere," which i can't say for some other scenes haha BUT i wish the follow through/climax of the y/n fic plot point had a bit more bite to it. in a way, the way yi wrote moon near the end was just as dehumanizing as the way mc saw him and treated him throughout the whole novel.

i couldn't quite tell over audiobook, but reading the interview, the author is pretty clearly very erudite and academic and very set in the way it should be read. i kind of wonder how she feels abt the popular interpretations of her work ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  

lucia

i feel like ppl only tell other ppl to read this for the shock value, not bc it's actually any good. read an interview w the author where she was explicit abt this not being a story about kpop or fandom at all, to which i absolutely agree — the mc (who is appropriately never named) does not behave or speak like a kpop fan, and the ties to kpop in the book are tenuous. instead, it's far more about identity, knowing oneself (and whether or not it is even possible to know one's self), perceptions of someone vs the reality of someone, and losing yourself in the search for real humanity/human connection, which may or may not exist. that being said, i think it is largely discussed as a book abt kpop and fandom, which to me is kind of uh not good in the sense that the author did not have any intention to critique or explore kpop fandoms in writing this, so her work should not be used to do so. like hello this woman clearly does not know abt kpop at all just from the way she writes abt it lol. i thought the interview i read was funny in the sense that yi clearly knew what she was wanting to convey to the extent that she was correcting the interviewer's perceptions of the novel, and i could absolutely see the points she was correcting the interviewer on, but i also think this novel is deeply misunderstood (as evidenced by it being marketed as a kpop + fandom related novel despite it not actually being a kpop + fandom related novel) and that incident is just proof of such. i myself definitely did not understand what was going on most of the time (aside from the fact that i simply did not have the brain capacity or willingness to dissect the meaning of each scene, i also listened to this on audiobook while i was packing to move, so i was a liiiittle distracted), and i'm not going to lie to you, i'm not sure if i have any interest in understanding it further. glad i kinda skimmed the audiobook just to know wtf is going on in public discourse, but that's about it. 

i will say i thought the book came most alive in the y/n story that the mc was writing, and i was most interested in what was going on during mc and moon's final interaction. i thought there were threads here that could have been interesting to explore — specifically the idea of crafting a story to be together in this life and the next and the blurring of reality to the point where mc seems to genuinely think her story is real — but again, not in the sense of like, "this means fandom and y/n fic is bad bc ppl clearly think it's real!" (bc again, it's clear from the way she talks abt the story that she's not rly a fan) but in the sense of like, "this is a plot point that makes sense to me and i can follow the thread of it and see that it's pushing the story forward to go somewhere," which i can't say for some other scenes haha BUT i wish the follow through/climax of the y/n fic plot point had a bit more bite to it. in a way, the way yi wrote moon near the end was just as dehumanizing as the way mc saw him and treated him throughout the whole novel.

i couldn't quite tell over audiobook, but reading the interview, the author is pretty clearly very erudite and academic and very set in the way it should be read. i kind of wonder how she feels abt the popular interpretations of her work ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  

britt

i am so conflicted about this book honestly. i loved the writing, but did not have the brain power at this point in time to get a few of the things in it. i understood a decent amount, but not all. also this was my first unhinged girly book and it delivered.

jennifer 

3.7
fun at first but dragged out and got kinda confusing…

definitely the most sophisticated piece of writing on parasocial relationships that i’ve read to date but that was a disadvantage to me.

at first it felt very satirical and funny to see kpop fandom terms described in mechanical ways and portrayed as a social science almost. and it was fine when it was the narrator speaking like this bc that was her quirk. like understanding the reasons and risk factors for obsession but still falling prey to it. i can get behind that idea.

but when i needed to google “what is masticate” only to find out it means to fucking chew,,, i was feeling like a line had been crossed. LIKE JUST SAY CHEW. esp since this was coming from a random woman in the streets of korea. just felt unnatural and overly pretentious. 

overall i didn’t find anything new except this book feeling like a strong a critique against parasocial relationships.

Every year I would do a book about some poor soul obsessed with an idol and it is quite pleasant how each of them end up, in their essence, being about vastly different things. "Y/N" pushes idol fan culture and the relationship between the two parties to a fabulistic extreme that somehow does not stray too far from the truth regardless. And maybe that is what makes the novel so fascinating and difficult to look away from.

I liked that it explored the obsession of the fan with the idol beyond sexuality (and in fact outright stated it was not about sexuality); it showed different levels of it, including one of the characters wanting to engage in fantasies of being the parent or main caregiver of their object of obsession, all of which gives the impression that Yi is very well acquinted with fan culture and helps elevate the novel. It succesfully holds up a mirror to its audience in a way that only an extreme depiction of a fact of real life could which makes it understandable why it prompts divisive opinions. And what more could an author want for a novel like this?

4☆ or just nearly

Every year I would do a book about some poor soul obsessed with an idol and it is quite pleasant how each of them end up, in their essence, being about vastly different things. "Y/N" pushes idol fan culture and the relationship between the two parties to a fabulistic extreme that somehow does not stray too far from the truth regardless. And maybe that is what makes the novel so fascinating and difficult to look away from.

I liked that it explored the obsession of the fan with the idol beyond sexuality (and in fact outright stated it was not about sexuality); it showed different levels of it, including one of the characters wanting to engage in fantasies of being the parent or main caregiver of their object of obsession, all of which gives the impression that Yi is very well acquinted with fan culture and helps elevate the novel. It succesfully holds up a mirror to its audience in a way that only an extreme depiction of a fact of real life could which makes it understandable why it prompts divisive opinions. And what more could an author want for a novel like this?

the most iykyk book i've ever read... felt like somewhere between a fever dream and a bad trip 

Y/n A Novel

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