THE MULTI-MILLION-COPY SELLING SOUTH KOREAN SENSATION THAT HAS GOT THE WHOLE WORLD TALKING

‘A ground-breaking work of feminist fiction.’ Stylist

Who is Kim Jiyoung?

Kim Jiyoung is a girl born to a mother whose in-laws wanted a boy. Kim Jiyoung is a sister made to share a room while her brother gets one of his own.

Kim Jiyoung is a female preyed upon by male teachers at school. Kim Jiyoung is a daughter whose father blames her when she is harassed late at night.

Kim Jiyoung is a good student who doesn’t get put forward for internships. Kim Jiyoung is a model employee but gets overlooked for promotion. Kim Jiyoung is a wife who gives up her career and independence for a life of domesticity.

Kim Jiyoung has started acting strangely.

Kim Jiyoung is depressed.

Kim Jiyoung is mad.

Kim Jiyoung is her own woman.

Kim Jiyoung is every woman.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 is the life story of one young woman born at the end of the twentieth century and raises questions about endemic misogyny and institutional oppression that are relevant to us all. Riveting, original and uncompromising, this is the most important book to have emerged from South Korea since Han Kang’s The Vegetarian.

Our Booksellers Say…

“The unsettling journey of Jiyoung, a stereotypical middle child, and her plight of ‘being a woman’ in modern Korean society. Amidst the well-rounded cultural gesticulations of cuisine, city life and ambition, we find cracks (supported by footnotes) in a social structure which, the more Jiyoung matures across the pages, the better she is able to identify the injustices she faces as a ‘second-rate citizen’.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 will undoubtedly get under your skin, where it should live, fuelling a simmering goal for a more equal world.”

Mirjam, Blackwell’s Online Bookseller

View all of Mirjam’s recommendations