Reviews
I can’t tell you too much about this book besides that it’s something I needed in this moment for different issues in my life now.
Wow. Was teary eyed on the train as soon as I reached the end of the book. Truly heartwarming.
beautiful without being extra verbose. i mean she could have been flexing her poet's background here and no one would bat an eye but clearly the deftness in navigating the language of selves to capture the multi generational tales is well accomplished and much envied.
this is a fluid, carefully curated tapestry of painful memories, small breakthrough moments, and the fleeting impressions of poetry. the heart of this book beats with a dull ache.
so much to unpack in this book, beautiful writing
"Neither (happiness) nor sadness are ever done with us. They are always passing by."
E. J.’s parents left her at age 15 with her 18 year-old brother in California and moved to Korea for her father to accept a coveted job. Ms Koh has turned her pain into something special. Letters from her mother are interspersed with Koh’s recounting of her struggles in school, her occasional visits to Korea, her trying to find her way.
I'm sure I wouldn't have found this book had I not won it in a Goodreads Giveaway. I'm thankful I did. As a mother, the story was particularly touching to me—and a tiny bit close to home. When the author was 14 and living in California, her mother and father moved back to Korea for a higher paying job, leaving her with her not-yet-twenty year old brother. They would not return for seven years, leaving her to finish raising herself alone. Every other chapter is a letter (translated from Korean) from mom to daughter; the chapter that follows is about some pivotal time in the author's life. It was a bit of a challenging read as it lacked a continuous flow, while at the same time moving quickly. Having a son who is a poet, I particularly liked the parts that gave insight into the soul of poets. My favorite line in the book, and one that will never leave me, was when the author's mother tells her friends what her daughter does for a living—"My daughter teaches people to let go." Now, I understand my son a little bit more.
Highlights
“Now that you’re older, I have somebody to talk to. I’ve been waiting forever. I’ll tell you everything about my life. When you have a daughter, you’ll think of men and say that’s how it must’ve felt then. But you don’t have to forgive me because you are my daughter. You don’t have to do anything for me, okay? I was born to do everything for you.”
“But one night, a man tossed a remark at her. Right there, my father brawled with him and nearly died when the man broke a beer bottle and stabbed my father in the throat, barely missing the jugular. The man had two friends with him. Both joined in the beating of my father. My mother called her brothers to rescue him. After that day, they got married. I was my father’s daughter because there was in me, other than my face, this love for my mother.”
“Lee knew that she loved the city, but he could not be with the children by himself. They belonged to her—not him. He was only their father, who could not love them as he used to or wanted to.”
“Jun could not die because she had children, everybody knew.”
Is to live with kids to suffer? My mom mentioned to me that having children who don’t give back to them is a waste
“If you have no suffering, you have no story to tell—isn’t it true?”
But to ask children to raise themselves feels too cruel
Neither happiness nor sadness are ever done with us.
“You can say anything you want—with magnanimity. We are poets, aren’t we?” “We don’t have a lot of things.” “We have poems,” she said. “Do we live on just words?” “No,” she said, laughing. “Nobody can do that.” I asked, “Does a poet have to be reasonable?” Joy opened a file with my name across the top. “Forgiveness doesn’t need a reason. It doesn’t follow a logical thought, so it frees you from having to be reasonable.”