“Her husband stared at her coldly. She was disappointed to find that he was so inflexible. He was having trouble accepting the situation he was in as his own. Perhaps he resented the fact that white people like him, rather than people of color, were putting them through this ordeal. Or maybe he was just … [Read More]
Booklist: Literature Fiction and Poetry (page 42)
Time in Gray (Bi-lingual, Vol 44 – Avant Garde)
“More than twenty years ago, for a short period, I was in love with a girl who was four years my senior and whose name was Su-mi. At the time I was going to an educational center that offered a course in Esperanto. There were two Americans in my class. One of them, Earl, was … [Read More]
On You (Bi-lingual, Vol 43 – Avant Garde)
Available on Kindle No synopsis available [Read More]
A Well in My Soul (Bi-lingual, Vol 42 – Avant Garde)
“It’s a lie that dogs bite people. That only happens because people train them too harshly. Dogs never voluntarily bite people. They bite only because they are trained to bite. Phrases like ‘son-of-a-bitch’ and ‘a dude like a dog’ or ‘worse than a dog’ aren’t curses. Because human beings are actually inferior to dogs. Dogs … [Read More]
Akeldama (Bi-lingual, Vol 41 – Avant Garde)
“What an unbearable hell. But I feel like I didn’t avoid it. I didn’t give up… I guess I can be proud that I managed to survive this hell. That’s right!” Judas was thinking about this, while he lost consciousness, trying to strain a few drops of honey and meanings from what he had just … [Read More]
In the Shade of the Oleander (Bi-lingual, Vol 40 – Tradition)
“There was a spoon in her room. It was a spoon she’d brought from home when she married. It was a brass spoon with its edge worn out and thinned like a crescent moon. That spoon was hung on the iron-ring handle of her bedroom door the first night she moved to her new home. … [Read More]
A Journey under the Moonlight (Bi-lingual, Vol 39 – Tradition)
“The man lifted his eyes up at the mound. In his mind he could see the corpse of his wife. She was flat on her back, stark naked, a dagger stuck in her groin. Because she had their first baby her stomach had looked unusually bloated. The man felt powerless as his lips parted and … [Read More]
The Fragrant Well (Bi-lingual, Vol 38 – Tradition)
No synopsis available Available on Kindle [Read More]
A Brief Biography of Yuja (Bi-lingual, Vol 37 – Tradition)
“Today is the day Chae Gwang-seok went away a hundred days ago, and Yu Jae-pil, the man who arranged for his headstone, will reunite with him on the other side of the river. ‘How’ve you been?’ ‘Welcome, brother. I’ve settled down in this neck of the woods and prepared the way for you. Say hello, … [Read More]
Three Days of Autumn, 1948 (Bi-lingual, Vol 36 – Tradition)
Not available at UK Amazon hence no Kindle version. No synopsis available [Read More]
Christmas Specials (Bi-lingual, Vol 35 – Seoul)
“A few days before Christmas, he was drinking coffee from a vending machine in the rest area of a library. He pulled out the fountain pen the woman had given him as a graduation present and started to jot down projected expenses for a Christmas date. Dinner: 20,000 won. Movie Tickets: 14,000 won. Present: 20,000 … [Read More]
Is That So? I’m a Giraffe (Bi-lingual, Vol 34 – Seoul)
Bilingual (Korean/English) edition of a surreal novella that “captures a brutally honest view of the sobering, tragic realities of Korean society” (from the Afterword by Kim Nam-hyeok) [Read More]
I Live in Bongcheon-dong (Bi-lingual, Vol 33 – Seoul)
No synopsis available. Currently not available at Amazon UK, though the US site has it, and you can usually rely on Seoul Selection. [Read More]
Traversing Afternoon (Bi-lingual, Vol 32 – Seoul)
No synopsis available. [Read More]
The Dark Jar within the Snowman (Bi-lingual, Vol 31 – Seoul)
“Before I knew it, the sun was setting. I returned to the nine-family house where by now my secret had surely been long exposed. I took a few deep breaths in front of the gate. I could only think about not wanting Mom to beat me with briquette tongs. But as I walked on the … [Read More]
Gingko Love (Bi-lingual, Vol 30 – South and North)
“The purest kind of love is that of our comrades, which cannot but be twisted because of the division of our fatherland. Mr. Cho, did you know that gingkoes are either male or female, unlike most trees, which are both? But the male and female gingkoes rarely stand side-by-side. They grow old alone for hundreds … [Read More]