Shoko’s Smile: Stories
Choi Eunyoung, Sing Ryu (translation)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 & 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.
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An award-winning debut from Choi Eunyoung, Shoko’s Smile is a collection of 5 short stories & 2 novellas that explore the joys & heartbreaks of human relationships as they blossom & wither. Largely following the nuanced relationships of women—between friends, lovers, & family—the book is a microscopic, almost obsessive, study of complex emotions underlying their personal interactions.
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Choi Eunyoung (b. 1984) has earned popular & critical acclaim for her poignant insights on human relationships & her portrayal of women, queers, victims of state violence, & other underrepresented voices. She made her literary debut in 2013 when her novella Shoko’s Smile won the Writers’ World Award for New Writers & the Munhakdongne Young Writers Award the following year. Her latest work is a short story collection entitled Someone Harmless to Me (2018).
Sung Ryu is a Korean translator based in Singapore. Her 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).