Pachinko (National Book Award Finalist)
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4.4 • 4K Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
One of the New York Times’ 100 Best Books of the 21st Century.
In this New York Times bestseller, four generations of a poor Korean immigrant family fight to control their destiny in 20th-century Japan.
“Stunning.” —New York Times Book Review
In the early 1900s, teenaged Sunja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls for a wealthy stranger. When she discovers she is pregnant—and that her lover is married—she accepts an offer of marriage from a gentle, sickly minister passing through on his way to Japan. But her decision to abandon her home, and to reject her son's powerful father, sets off a dramatic saga that will echo down through the generations.
Profoundly moving, Pachinko is a story of love, sacrifice, ambition, and loyalty.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • #1 BOSTON GLOBE BESTSELLER • USA TODAY BESTSELLER • WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER • WASHINGTON POST BESTSELLER
Includes a reading group guide!
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
An immersive and compulsively readable saga, Min Jin Lee's novel follows one family for more than half a century, tracking their winding course from a seaside village in occupied Korea to gambling halls in Japan. We adore this 2017 National Book Award finalist for its beautifully realized characters, historical insights, and flawless depictions of family strife, loyalty, and love.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Lee's (Free Food for Millionaires) latest novel is a sprawling and immersive historical work that tells the tale of one Korean family's search for belonging, exploring questions of history, legacy, and identity across four generations. In the Japanese-occupied Korea of the 1910s, young Sunja accidentally becomes pregnant, and a kind, tubercular pastor offers to marry her and act as the child's father. Together, they move away from Busan and begin a new life in Japan. In Japan, Sunja and her Korean family suffer from seemingly endless discrimination, and yet they are also met with moments of great love and renewal. As Sunja's children come of age, the novel reveals the complexities of family national history. What does it mean to live in someone else's motherland? When is history a burden, and when does history lift a person up? This is a character-driven tale, but Lee also offers detailed histories that ground the story. Though the novel is long, the story itself is spare, at times brutally so. Sunja's isolation and dislocation become palpable in Lee's hands. Reckoning with one determined, wounded family's place in history, Lee's novel is an exquisite meditation on the generational nature of truly forging a home.
Customer Reviews
Three quarters excellent, last quarter bad
I am fortunate to be married to a wonderful Korean woman with a story that mirrors Pachinko. So I understand the nature of the Korean mother and their devotion and sacrifice for their family. This book was on point for the first three fourths, then it fell apart. The focus on debauchery and gratuitous sex of a younger generation was both suspect and a turn off. I clearly understand that the descendants of the Pachinko generation were conflicted and confused, but those that I know went to Stanford, Harvard, Columbia and became doctors, lawyers and financial tycoons and did not become alcoholics, drugs users, or prostitutes as depicted in the final chapters of this book. Perhaps this was autobiographical on the part of the author, but it does not represent the younger Korean generation that I know. Because of this I struggled to finish the book and still have an uncomfortable feeling about the last parts, because I don’t believe it represents reality.
Page turner
Fantastic story following the generations of a Korean family.
Had to Abandon this book
The book captured my interest, but that’s the only thing good about it. Well I guess I also learned something about the depressing side of Korean and Japanese culture, but it was just so seedy and depressing, without being cathartic in any way, I had to put it down after being 60%through it.