Winter in Sokcho
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Book Overview
2021 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER FOR TRANSLATED LITERATURE
As if Marguerite Duras wrote Convenience Store Woman--a beautiful, unexpected novel from a debut French Korean author
It's winter in Sokcho, a tourist town on the border between South and North Korea. The cold slows everything down. Bodies are red and raw, the fish turn venomous, beyond the beach guns point out from the North's watchtowers. A young French Korean woman works as a receptionist in a tired guesthouse. One evening, an unexpected guest arrives: a French cartoonist determined to find inspiration in this desolate landscape.
The two form an uneasy relationship. When she agrees to accompany him on trips to discover an "authentic" Korea, they visit snowy mountaintops and dramatic waterfalls, and cross into North Korea. But he takes no interest in the Sokcho she knows--the gaudy neon lights, the scars of war, the fish market where her mother works. As she's pulled into his vision and taken in by his drawings, she strikes upon a way to finally be seen.
An exquisitely-crafted debut, which won the Prix Robert Walser, Winter in Sokcho is a novel about shared identities and divided selves, vision and blindness, intimacy and alienation. Elisa Shua Dusapin's voice is distinctive and unmistakable.
Customer Reviews
Hiver à Sokcho Mentions in Our Blog
The 2022 National Book Award (NBA) finalists were announced this week. The prestigious annual literary award includes five different categories—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature—with five finalists for each. Read on for the complete list.
The 2021 National Book Award finalists were announced last week. This prestigious annual literary award includes five different categories—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature—with five finalists for each. Read on for the twenty-five books that made the cut.
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