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It's winter in Sokcho, a tourist town on the border between South and North Korea. The cold slows everything down. Bodies are red and raw, the fish turn venomous, beyond the beach guns point out from the North's watchtowers. A young French Korean woman works as a receptionist in a tired guesthouse. One evening, an unexpected guest arrives: a French cartoonist determined to find inspiration in this desolate landscape. The two form an uneasy relationship. When she agrees to accompany him on trips to discover an "authentic" Korea, they visit snowy mountaintops and dramatic waterfalls, and cross into North Korea. But he takes no interest in the Sokcho she knows--the gaudy neon lights, the scars of war, the fish market where her mother works. As she's pulled into his vision and taken in by his drawings, she strikes upon a way to finally be seen.… (more)
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A French cartoonist/illustrator arrives. It is winter, and it is cold and business is slow. She finds him interesting--and he finds her interesting.
This book is somehow a mashup of [book:That Time of Year|51243985] and [book:Convenience Store Woman|38357895]--but I liked both of those books more.
But neither the narrator, nor the cartoonist are the main characters in this story - Sokcho overshadows them both. While the human characters feel as if they were just sketched, the town is there in all its beauty; with its traditional culture and empty streets. And between the author and the translator, the language makes you want to stop and listen (although I wish there was a dictionary/notes in some places). How close is that description to the real town is unclear. But it does not matter. With the author being French Korean just as her narrator is(albeit one living in the other culture), I suspect that at least part of the story is based on her real life.
If you feel like reading a relatively short and very melancholy book about a town by the sea, steeped in Korean culture, give this one a try. It probably won't work for everyone but I enjoyed it.