Reviews

Folklorn by Angela Mi Young Hur

belovedsnail's review against another edition

challenging emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

A bit messy, but wonderful.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death

sgpapagikos's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.75

kleonard's review

5.0

This is a devastating book about mental illness and family secrets and domestic abuse. A young scientist struggles with her relationships and work, and when her mother dies, she experiences a collapse, unable to find a path back, unable to find coherence in her life and the lives of her brother and father. Seeking a kind of therapy through folklore, she batters her way forward, moving and thinking erratically. This novel captures schizophrenia and paranoia in a remarkable, first-person narrative, and aptly describes the kinds of confused reactions from those who unknowingly witness it.

enoyes's review

challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

bridrizzle72's review against another edition

challenging informative mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

nicovivi's review

It started out interesting, but the whole story just felt like a very disjointed vignettes of "this is how Korean American 2nd generation immigrants go through". If the overarching threading of the story was done in a matter that was compelling to read, but to me, this was hard to push through, and made me DNF after 60% or so. 

jo_d's review

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

ivywall's review

I liked the concept but I couldn’t get through it. They just kept talking about planet of the apes.

tkuchta's review

adventurous challenging mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.25

dreamgalaxies's review

3.0

There are some really beautiful and meditative passages here, and exploration of lots of deep and complex themes related to otherness, imperialism, transracial adoption, mental health and so on. Unfortunately, much of it is addressed in long and stilted dialogue that didn’t work as well for me as a more subtle or metaphorical treatment might’ve. A lot of this is probably due to info dumps from one of the characters. I generally didn’t like the style of dialogue used here. I also found this much too long and meandering. Needed a stronger editorial hand.

I did love the mythological focus and the layering. Lots to like here despite the issues.