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Book Summary and Reviews of Shelter by Jung Yun

Shelter by Jung Yun

Shelter

by Jung Yun

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  • Mar 2016, 336 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

You can never know what goes on behind closed doors.

Why should a man care for his parents when they failed to take care of him as a child?

Kyung Cho is a young father burdened by a house he can't afford. For years, he and his wife, Gillian, have lived beyond their means. Now their debts and bad decisions are catching up with them, and Kyung is anxious for his family's future.

A few miles away, his parents, Jin and Mae, live in the town's most exclusive neighborhood, surrounded by the material comforts that Kyung desires for his wife and son. As a child, he had every possible advantage --- private tutors, expensive hobbies --- but his parents never showed him kindness. Kyung can hardly bear to see them now, much less ask for their help. Yet when an act of violence leaves Jin and Mae unable to live on their own, the dynamic suddenly changes, and he's compelled to take them in. For the first time in years, the Chos find themselves living under the same roof. Tensions quickly mount as Kyung's proximity to his parents forces old feelings of guilt and anger to the surface, along with a terrible and persistent question: How can he ever be a good husband, father, and son when he never knew affection as a child?

As Shelter veers swiftly toward its startling conclusion, Jung Yun leads us through dark and violent territory, where, unexpectedly, the Chos discover hope. In the tradition of Affliction and House of Sand and Fog, Shelter is a masterfully crafted debut novel that asks what it means to provide for one's family and, in answer, delivers a story as riveting as it is profound.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Starred Review.... this work should find itself on best-of lists, among major award nominations, and in eager readers' hands everywhere." - Library Journal

"Yun's characters don't merely desire walls and a roof, although houses have a powerful and intelligent presence here. A diverse and nuanced cast of characters seeks shelter from pain and loneliness in this valiant portrayal of contemporary American life." - Kirkus

"In her intense debut, Yun explores the powerful legacy of familial violence and the difficulty of finding the strength and grace to forgive... This family drama [is] rife with tension and unexpected ironies." - Publishers Weekly

"Skilled [and] deeply disconcerting...A work of relentless psychological sleuthing and sensitive insight." - Booklist

This information about Shelter was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

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CarolK

Shelter
Kyung Cho and his wife, Gillian, are in over their heads financially. Things are so bad that they are facing the reality that their home must be sold. As a reader I felt the doom as the realtor, Gertie, delivers the stark news that the sale of their house may not bail them out. Gertie seems uninterested in this lower class sale and becomes even more distracted by something in the Cho’s backyard. All three can’t believe their eyes. It’s a woman, a naked woman at that, and the real shocker is that it appears to be Kyung’s mother, Mae. On reaching her, Kyung sees she is bruised, and dirty and is begging for help. This beginning sets the tone of what can only be seen as a plummeting course of disaster.

I found this story of a dysfunctional family sad, fascinating and haunting at the same time. Kyung and his family immigrated to America from Korea when he was a young boy. The author, Jung Yun is quick to point out that Koreans are not the sum of her characters but I feel culture definitely plays a role in who these characters are, how they live and their interrelationships in family. They need not be Korean though. This could be any first or second-generation nationality bringing their cultural mores to America and adapting to life here.

Shelter is a story immersed in secrets kept, guilt, duty, abuse, love and hate. It explores how all of these define Kyung and his family and the context of home. The title itself found me contemplating the meaning of the word. Is shelter the home, the protective sanctuary it should be? Shelter, with its clash of culture and family conflict has the forlorn tone of another favorite book of mine, The House of Sand and Fog, and may appeal to those who found that book a compelling read.

Jung Yun has written an outstanding, intricately woven, debut. It begs reflection and discussion.

Maggie R. (Canoga Park, CA)

Shelter
Another excellent book that takes the reader into the inner workings of a complicated family. At once painful and familiar, the emotions and relationships of Kyung, his wife and parents are exposed following a horrendous violation. Highly recommended.

Donna W. (Lansing, NY)

Skeletons in the closet...
Well written and hard to put down. Great character development through the melding of an Americanized son with his traditional, Korean parents.

The family tragedy brings a great many forces to a head, and brings to life all of the myriad of flaws of this family.

Family secrets culminate in mixed emotions throughout the maladjusted family dynamic. A grown man comes to grips with the raw emotions experienced throughout his childhood as he tries to make sense of it all...

Sheila B. (Danvers, MA)

Riveting family study
A damaged family fraught with secrets---until it blows wide open. Unspeakable acts behind closed doors; survivors and victims. Realistic reactions to terrible events. I liked this book a LOT as it is a study in man's inhumanity to man and its effects on the children and the children of those children.

Rose N. (Saginaw, MI)

Shelter
Kyung Cho is a Korean-American college professor with a young family and a lot of debt who has always tried to 'fit in'. He grew up with cold and abusive parents, Jin and Mae, who live in luxury near Kyung and have had little to do with the Cho family through the years. When his parents experience a horrible tragedy and must move in with the Chos, Kyung's life slowly begins to unravel. He is astounded and envious of the love with which his father, Jin, enfolds his son, Ethan...love that has always been withheld from Kyung. Kyung is unable to feel the love and sympathy that he knows he should feel toward his parents. He is also unable to accept the fact that his parents are sharing his home and his family as they have never cared to do in the past. Kyung's life begins spinning out of control.

This is a compelling and emotional story of love, loss, guilt and forgiveness. This is a book ripe for sharing and discussion.

Carolyn V. (Douglass, KS)

Shelter
I classify books as "Easy to put down" or "Easy to pick up". Shelter is an easy to pick up book. You wanted to get back to it to find out how the defining event of the novel came to be.
I wanted to read this book for the characters – a birth family, a mother, a son, a father, a son's married family. The characters were well done; you got to know them and the reasons for their behavior. It is true that children really never know their parents. There is so much more to a life than parenting. The sense of duty and independence on the part of the son were believable and sympatric.
The ending was hinted at so it wasn't just a surprise out of nowhere. I appreciate a novelist's ability to cause use to say to ourselves, "I should have seen that coming!"
I have wondered how plausible the ending scene with the father and son really was, given the lack of emotional expression within their culture. After reflection I have decided that it was plausible, but it makes me want to know about their life after the end of the novel. Highest praise for a novel is when I keep thinking about it after I have finished reading it

...23 more reader reviews

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Author Information

Jung Yun

Jung Yun was born in South Korea, grew up in North Dakota, and was educated at Vassar College, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Her work has appeared in Tin House (the "Emerging Voices" issue); The Best of Tin House: Stories, edited by Dorothy Allison; and The Massachusetts Review; and she is a recipient of an honorable mention for the Pushcart Prize and an Artist's Fellowship in fiction from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. She lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband.

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