The Apology

Locations
Call Number: Fiction / Han, Jimin, Adult Book / Fiction / Horror / Han, Jimin
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Fiction / Han, Jimin	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Horror / Han, Jimin	4-week checkout	Due 05-23-2024
Westgate Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Horror / Han, Jimin	4-week checkout	Due 05-03-2024

"In South Korea, a 105-year-old woman receives a letter. Ten days later, she has been thrust into the afterlife, fighting to head off a curse that will otherwise devastate generations to come. Hak Jeonga has always shouldered the burden of upholding the family name. When she sent her daughter-in-law to America to cover up an illegitimate birth, she was simply doing what was needed to preserve the reputations of her loved ones. How could she have known that decades later, this decision would return to haunt her--threatening to tear apart her bond with her beloved son, her relationship with her infuriatingly insolent sisters, and the future of the family she has worked so hard to protect? Part ghost story and part family epic, The Apology is an incisive tale of sisterhood and diaspora, reaching back to the days of Japanese colonialism and the Korean War, and told through the singular voice of a defiant, funny, and unforgettable centenarian.

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Unique family saga submitted by redwood on July 30, 2023, 12:33pm The Apology considers unresolved business in the afterlife. Jeonga, the 105-year-old protagonist, is killed by a bus on a visit to family in Chicago, and has to encounter already-deceased loved ones and set things right with the still-living from beyond, letting go of the family secrets she long worked to conceal. Chief among them is that her son had an illegitimate daughter; her trip from Korea to America was to prevent her secret great-granddaughter from marrying her long-lost sister’s great-grandson. Jeonga’s relationships with her sisters, their descendants, and her household employee Chohui are multilayered, complicated not only by standard societal divisions but also by the North-South Korea border. Han’s vision of the afterlife is odd and generatively confusing, providing a chance for Jeonga, a sometimes irritating character, to reconcile with her choices. This is an original and surprising family saga told in a carefully-cultivated narrative voice.