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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Nov 2018, 304 pages
Paperback:
Nov 2019, 304 pages
Book Reviewed by:
BookBrowse First Impression Reviewers
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From the author of The Calligrapher's Daughter comes the riveting story of two sisters, one raised in the United States, the other in South Korea, and the family that bound them together even as the Korean War kept them apart.
In 1948 Najin and Calvin Cho, with their young daughter Miran, travel from South Korea to the United States in search of new opportunities. Wary of the challenges they know will face them, Najin and Calvin make the difficult decision to leave their infant daughter, Inja, behind with their extended family; soon, they hope, they will return to her.
But then war breaks out in Korea, and there is no end in sight to the separation. Miran grows up in prosperous American suburbia, under the shadow of the daughter left behind, as Inja grapples in her war-torn land with ties to a family she doesn't remember. Najin and Calvin desperately seek a reunion with Inja, but are the bonds of love strong enough to reconnect their family over distance, time, and war? And as deep family secrets are revealed, will everything they long for be upended?
Told through the alternating perspectives of the distanced sisters, and inspired by a true story, The Kinship of Secrets explores the cruelty of war, the power of hope, and what it means to be a sister.
Excerpt
The Kinship of Secrets
On a chilly summer night, a newsmonger trudged uphill to a residential enclave of Seoul, the last neighborhood on his route. By the dim light of his lantern swinging atop a bamboo pole, he checked his watch, clacked his wooden clappers three times, and, with the crystalline tones of his nighttime newscast, sang, “Attention, please, attention. Tuesday, twenty-seven June, three-thirty a.m. The North Korean People’s Army retreats after our heroic counteroffensive in Uijongbu. Enemy tanks were destroyed, and our forces have mobilized to repulse the enemy all the way to the Yalu River. President Rhee urges the people of Korea to trust our military without being unsettled in the least, to carry on with their daily work and support military operations. Attention, please, attention.”
His call echoed against the bulky profile of a Western-style house, where Inja, nearly four years old, lived with her maternal uncle, aunt, grandparents, as well ...
I recommend this book to anyone who loves language, powerful storytelling, and well-developed characters...Hopefully novels such as these will spur people to think more deeply about the individuals we read about in the news, especially those too young to influence their own future...continued
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(Reviewed by BookBrowse First Impression Reviewers).
Jung Yun, author of Shelter
What an extraordinary time to read this heartfelt novel about the bonds of family, set against the backdrop of the Korean War. Eugenia Kim is a masterful storyteller who makes her characters come to life as she spans decades, continents, and cultures. Krys Lee, author of How I Became a North Korean
I felt as though I had stepped into a graceful story of two countries, South Korea and America, and family ties that survive the challenges of history. Marie Myung-Ok Lee, author of Somebody's Daughter
A gripping story of war and immigration, as well as a tender meditation on what it means to be of a family and of a country. Min Jin Lee, author of Pachinko and Free Food for Millionaires
Eugenia Kim's The Kinship of Secrets is a beautiful allegory of loss and recovery. Through the parallel growth of two separated sisters, Kim bears witness to the fall and rise of a nation and its resilient and generous people. The Kinship of Secrets is a gorgeous achievement. Yoojin Grace Wuertz, author of Everything Belongs to Us
The Korean War has been called 'the forgotten war' in the West, but Kim's second novel, a powerful narrative about the ways families relentlessly love and protect each other despite immense challenges, is a story that demands to be remembered, along with its history. The Kinship of Secrets is both a meditation on homesickness and celebration of homecoming that made me appreciate the complicated bonds between sisters, between mothers and daughters, and love for relatives that become surrogate parents. A beautiful novel, and a necessary, important story for our times.
In Eugenia Kim's novel The Kinship of Secrets, sisters Inja and Miran are separated by the military action known in Western countries as the Korean War. Officially a "police action" – war was never declared – it is frequently referred to as "the Forgotten War" or the "Unknown War," as many Americans knew little about it due to government censorship of its coverage at the time. South Koreans generally refer to it as the six-two-five-war (yook-ee-oh junjeng) for the day and month in 1950 that the conflict began, while the North Koreans refer to it as the Fatherland Liberation War. China, which also became involved in the hostilities, officially calls it the War to Resist America and Aid Korea.
The Korean Peninsula was part of ...
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