Korean-translated books
I went out of my comfort zone and tried new genres and loved them, honestly, that was the best thing I have ever done. So, for those who just read fantasy, these novels might be different from the ones you are used to reading, but they are phenomenal and eminent; you won’t regret reading them. So here I am sharing ten amazing novels for you to enjoy as well.
(COMMENT DOWN BELOW THE NOVEL YOU WILL READ OR HAVE READ)
- Human Acts
- Pachinko
- Nothing to Envy
- Almond
- In order to Live
- The orphan master’s son
- Untold night and days
- Kim Ji-young, Born 1982
- The plotters
- The nine-cloud dream
Written by internationally bestselling author Hang Kang (The Vegetarian), a novel about a woman's descent into mental illness and neglect from her family This historical novel examines the universal topics of grief, guilt, brutality, and injustices through the events that occurred in 1980 in the South Korean city of Gwangju. This tragic story follows a boy named Dong-Ho and tells the tales of people who suffered and are still traumatized because of that event, even decades later.
This novel by Min Jin Lee, a Korean American author and journalist, follows the four generations of a Korean family that immigrated to Japan. This character-driven story features an ensemble of characters who encounter racism, discrimination, stereotyping, and other aspects of the 20th-century Korean experience of Japan. Recently, this novel has been converted into a drama series; if you are interested, you can check it out.
This intriguing story is set in North Korea, where people don’t have access to the internet or basic living facilities, where radio and television dials are welded to the government station, and where displays of affection are punished. We follow the lives of six average North Korean citizens as they fall in love, raise families, nurture ambitions, and struggle for survival. One by one, we experience the moments when they realize that their government has betrayed them.
Nothing to Envy is a ground-breaking addition to the literature on totalitarianism and an eye-opening look at a closed world that is of increasing global importance.
Recommended by Kim Namjoon of BTS, this novel follows Yunjae, who was born with a brain condition that enabled him to feel emotion, but his mother and grandmother weren’t fazed by his condition. They both constantly taught him when to smile, when to say "thank you, and when to laugh. However, he was left alone to figure it out by himself on his sixteenth birthday when his mother and grandmother were killed in a tragic event.
Pak Jun Do is the haunted son of a lost and influential father who runs a work camp for orphans called Long Tomorrows. There the boy is given his first taste of power, picking which orphans eat first and which will be lent out for manual labor. Recognized for his loyalty and keen instincts, Jun Do comes to the attention of superiors in the state and becomes the professional kidnapper of Japanese citizens.
After an event, he was driven to the absolute limit of what any human being could endure, and then he boldly took on the treacherous role of rival to Kim Jong Il in an attempt to save the woman he loved, Sun Moon, a legendary actress "so pure, she didn't know what starving people looked like."
Part breathless thriller, part story of innocence lost, and part story of romantic love, The Orphan Master's Son is also a riveting portrait of a world heretofore hidden from view: a North Korea rife with hunger, corruption, and casual cruelty but also with camaraderie, stolen moments of beauty, and love. A towering literary achievement, The Orphan Master's Son ushers Adam Johnson into the small group of today's greatest writers.
Untold Night and Day tells the story of a young woman’s journey through Seoul over the course of a night and a day. It’s 28-year-old Ayami’s final day at her box-office job in Seoul’s audio theater. Her night is spent walking the sweltering streets of the city with her former boss in search of Yeoni, their missing elderly friend, and her day is spent looking after a mysterious, visiting poet. Their conversations take in art, love, food, and the inaccessible country to the north.
Almost immediately, in the heat of Seoul at the height of the summer, order gives way to chaos as the edges of reality start to fray, with Ayami becoming an unwitting escort into a fever dream of increasingly tangled threads, all the while images of the characters’ overlapping realities repeat, collide, change, and reassert themselves in this masterful work that upends the very structure of fiction and narrative storytelling and burns itself upon the soul of the reader.
By one of the boldest and most innovative voices in contemporary Korean literature and brilliantly realized in English by International Man Booker Prize–winning translator Deborah Smith, Bae Suah’s hypnotic and wholly original novel asks whether more than one version of ourselves can exist at once, demonstrating the malleable nature of reality as we know it.
From the novelist dubbed "the Korean Henning Mankell" (The Guardian) comes a fantastical crime novel set in an alternate Seoul where assassination guilds compete for market dominance. Perfect for fans of Han Kang and Patrick deWitt.
Behind every assassination, there is an anonymous mastermind—a plotter—working in the shadows. Plotters quietly dictate the moves of the city's most dangerous criminals, but their existence is little more than a legend. Just who are the plotters? And more importantly, what do they want?
Reseng is an assassin. Raised by a cantankerous killer named Old Raccoon in the crime headquarters "The Library," Reseng never questioned anything: where to go, whom to kill, or why his home was filled with books that no one ever read. But one day, Reseng steps out of line on a job, toppling a set of carefully calibrated plans. And when he uncovers an extraordinary scheme set into motion by an eccentric trio of young women—a convenience store clerk, her wheelchair-bound sister, and a cross-eyed librarian—Reseng will have to decide if he will remain a pawn or finally take control of the plot.
Crackling with action and filled with unforgettable characters, The Plotters is a deeply entertaining thriller that soars with the soul, wit, and lyricism of real literary craft.
Korea’s most prized literary masterpiece: a Buddhist journey questioning the illusions of human life—presented in a vivid new translation by PEN/Hemingway finalist Heinz Insu Fenkl
Often considered the highest achievement in Korean fiction, The Nine Cloud Dream poses the question: will the life we dream of truly make us happy? Written in 17th-century Korea, this classic novel’s wondrous story begins when a young monk living on a sacred Lotus Peak in China succumbs to the temptation of eight fairy maidens. For doubting his master’s Buddhist teachings, the monk is forced to endure a strange punishment: reincarnation as the most ideal of men.
On his journey through this new life full of material, martial, and sensual accomplishments beyond his wildest dreams, he encounters the eight fairies in human form, each one furthering his path toward understanding the fleeting value of his good fortune. As his successes grow, he comes closer and closer to finally comprehending the fundamental truths of the Buddha’s teachings. Like Hesse’s Siddhartha, The Nine Cloud Dreams is an unforgettable tale exploring the meaning of a good life and the virtue of living simply with mindfulness.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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