Name: Love in the Big City
Rating: 3.904411764705882 (68 reviews)
ISBN: 9780802158789

Sang Young Park

A funny, transporting, surprising, and poignant novel that was one of the highest selling debuts of recent years in Korea, Love in the Big City tells the story of a young gay man searching for happiness in the lonely city of Seoul

Love in the Big City

대도시의 사랑법

Helen 

I think that's why I was so terrible to you. I was scared. I wanted to keep you in my tiny soy-sauce dish of a world forever.

I used to feel that l'd been given the whole world when I held you. 

I used to feel like l’d been given the whole world when I held him.

“I’m not happy about the saury. I like the universe that is you.” 

“She had always been that kind of person. Someone who knew everything, who saw through everything.” 

Because, whatever it was or wasn't, you were you.

If, at first, I felt guilty about wasting my life away, I soon came to think, Well, whatever. Let's see how far my money goes, let's go as far as life will take me.

Jaehee, who had taught me that every season is its own beautiful moment.

Rain still falls during the late rainy season, as do tears even when it's too late.

Tada

i can never move on from their story one of my favorite books and shows ever just so so so special to me 😔💔

nina 

A fresh and unique debut novel by the bestselling young star of Korean queer fiction.

"Love in the Big City" is an energetic, joyful, and moving novel that depicts both the glittering nighttime world of Seoul and the bleary-eyed morning-after. 

Young is a cynical yet fun-loving Korean student who pinballs from home to class to the beds of recent Tinder matches. He and Jaehee, his female best friend and roommate, frequent nearby bars where they suppress their anxieties about their love lives, families, and money with rounds of soju and freezer-chilled Marlboro Reds. Yet in time even Jaehee settles down, leaving Young alone to care for his ailing mother and find companionship in his relationships with a series of men, including one whose handsomeness is matched by his coldness, and another who might end up being the great love of his life.

I feel bad for Young, but also, sometimes he really kind of auto sabotages himself, with Jae Hee, Gyu-ho and work/life. I do get why he broke up with Gyu-ho, and the strength he needed to do that, but it somehow also made me sad for both of them. 

That aside, I really liked the book and how it talked about topics like “Kylie”, how it was part of him, but not who he was. Also, his experiences and obstacles he faced for being a gay man are talked about in a very interesting way. 

Denisse Garcia Ramírez 

I feel bad for Young, but also, sometimes he really kind of auto sabotages himself, with Jae Hee, Gyu-ho and work/life. I do get why he broke up with Gyu-ho, and the strength he needed to do that, but it somehow also made me sad for both of them. 

That aside, I really liked the book and how it talked about topics like “Kylie”, how it was part of him, but not who he was. Also, his experiences and obstacles he faced for being a gay man are talked about in a very interesting way. 

Perfect realistic ending too

Didn't really expect anything when I read it, I liked the blurbs so I queued for it on Libby and when I finally could read it, it blew me away. About a gay man and his story about the relationships he's ever had and how he's only truly loved one person afterwards. Exploration about HIV and how characters navigate their lives with it which affects not only their relationship but also just everything.... It's funny and a really light and easy read, but also so gut wrenching. Not a big fan of the stylization of the writing? But I think I'm getting used to it because many Asian literatures are styled like that. Good read still.

🦌

A book from a Korean author representing the unspoken and complicated moments of queer love. The struggles with choosing to love and the forcefulness of others’ love. I definitely cried on a bus ride while reading this. 

This queer book was beautiful. An enjoyable read, read this in like one-sitting and though it was not much of a page-turner, I still find myself getting too immersed with it. I feel like this is another 'no plot just vibe' type of book, but I enjoyed every second of it and I didn't even think that it was boring, not even for a second. This book felt so bleak, lonely, complex, and as a reader I found myself confused as well with how the narrator's twelve-years older boyfriend treated him, how the narrator feels lonely after a breakup with his most recent lover.

And as a sucker for love amidst small, simple mundane activities, I have to say that I love this particular scene so much. It truly warmed my heart when the narrator mentioned:

This was really freshing to me. I loved every second of it.

nindy

This queer book was beautiful. An enjoyable read, read this in like one-sitting and though it was not much of a page-turner, I still find myself getting too immersed with it. I feel like this is another 'no plot just vibe' type of book, but I enjoyed every second of it and I didn't even think that it was boring, not even for a second. This book felt so bleak, lonely, complex, and as a reader I found myself confused as well with how the narrator's twelve-years older boyfriend treated him, how the narrator feels lonely after a breakup with his most recent lover.


 Even after hating him so much I felt like killing him, I’d find myself turning back to Gyu-ho as if nothing had happened and saying things like “What are we having for dinner tomorrow?” or “Please don’t forget to buy trash bags tomorrow at the store.” Mostly we slept on our own beds but occasionally in the same one, not having sex but taking turns giving each other an arm-pillow, breathing in the scent of each other’s chests or armpits, slowly coming to believe that this was what it meant to love and be together. 


And as a sucker for love amidst small, simple mundane activities, I have to say that I love this particular scene so much. It truly warmed my heart when the narrator mentioned:


 We laughed at each other’s jokes, kissed, deboned fish for each other and placed the flesh on each other’s spoons, occasionally showered together (...) 


This was really freshing to me. I loved every second of it.

Frederik De Bosschere

Embarking on a tour of South Korea, I felt I needed to add some local literature to my diet. Being a sucker for career-starting coming-of-age novels (Bright Lights, Big City!), this book presented an ideal starting point for my journey. I felt the first part tried too hard to be cool (as opposed to BLBC, which just _is_). But as the stories went on, I did find I had become more invested in the protagonist. However, the intensity level of that investment never truly made it beyond ‘interesting’. Still, it’s a good read. (And for fellow travelers: reading this while in Seoul adds to the experience, for sure.)

KW Tan

surprisingly romantic at the very end, for such a bleak book, which was a pleasant but almost upsetting surprise, i don't know, that the narrator should still believe however furtively in love in some sense ahh idk

Kwan Ann Tan

Oh my gosh.... this really made me cry with the last section... I'm so emotional!!!

Josh Clement

In an unsuspecting and often very funny way, Young uses writing to inspect and observe his relationships and feelings. Or in his words 'to prove...that it was 100 percent real'. These are simple slices of life, getting an upgraded hotel room and rained on in Bangkok, eating sushi in bed, walking with your sick mum in the park, but written with real honesty and so much heart.

jiaqi kang

wow. just brilliant. so gripping and vivid from page 1 all the way through to the end. i feel honored to have been able to read this

Love in the Big City

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