Shoko's Smile

In crisp, unembellished prose, Eun-young Choi paints intimate portraits of the lives of young women in South Korea, balancing the personal with the political. In the title story, a fraught friendship between an exchange student and her host sister follows them from adolescence to adulthood. In "A Song from Afar," a young woman grapples with the death of her lover, traveling to Russia to search for information about the deceased. In "Secret," the parents of a teacher killed in the Sewol ferry sinking hide the news of her death from her grandmother.

 
In the tradition of Sally Rooney, Banana Yoshimoto, & Marilynne Robinson—writers from different cultures who all take an unvarnished look at human relationships and the female experience—Choi Eunyoung is a writer to watch.

Sung Ryu is a Korean translator based in Singapore. Her forthcoming translations include Shoko’s Smile by Choi Eunyoung & I’m Waiting for You: And Other Stories by Kim Bo-young (co-translated with Sophie Bowman).