Reviews

Finding Junie Kim by Ellen Oh

bisco's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring sad 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? It's complicated

4.5

ehahn's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring fast-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

5.0

kelsie17's review

dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.5

bryndng's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

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

5.0

dominicangirl's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative sad tense slow-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? No

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Hate crime, Bullying, Racism, Violence, and War

mamazubbles's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.0

thebookishunicorn's review against another edition

5.0

"Junie, always remember that silence is a weapon. When people don't speak up, and let evil continue unchecked, they too have become corrupt."

katiegrrrl's review against another edition

4.0

Junie is dealing with really intense racist incidents at her middle school, which she isn’t telling any of the adults in her life about. A school project to learn more about the Great or Silent generation brings her closer to her grandparents as she learns about their childhoods in Korea during the Korean war.

2022 YMA Asian/Pacific American Children’s Literature honor

jwinchell's review against another edition

4.0

Finding Junie Kim reminded me why I read books meant for younger readers. I wasn’t sure about this one at first— it’s long, and I had been reading literary fiction and memoirs. But Junie’s first person narration drew me in and I was impressed with the quick building of Junie’s world—newly diagnosed depression, a racist bully, racist and anti-Semitic graffiti at her school (which happened at my school during the Trump administration), her time with her grandparents. I loved the 3rd person narration of her grandparents’ stories of surviving the Korean War. Like Inside Out and Back Again did for me with the Vietnam War, this book helped me understand the Korean War from a Korean perspective. And this is a war I don’t know much about in general since my grandparents’ war was WWII and my parents’ war was Vietnam. Ellen Oh does a masterful job of weaving in what must have been an enormous amount of research along with family history into a compulsively readable work of contemporary and historical fiction. Junie finds her voice and figures out how to navigate the racist waters of her middle school world. I devoured this book in one day. Highly recommended.

meaganmart's review against another edition

4.0

Junie Kim feels bogged down by the casual racism she finds in her day-to-day life. She feels anxious and depressed about her friends' decisions to confront the racism they find in their school, a decision she feels will lead to no progress and do anything but make their friend group feel more burned out. When she shares these feelings with her grandparents, she is shocked by the vehemence with which her grandfather shuts down this way of thinking. He shares the anti-Asian sentiment he and his grandmother felt as newly arrived immigrants to the United States and also shares the trauma and division that he experienced growing up during the Korean War.

Junie is shocked by her grandfather's wartime experience and becomes determined not to be a bystander in her own story. She works with her friends to form an antiracism coalition and works to record her grandfather and grandmother's stories of growing up during a war to save their family history forever. Junie draws on the strength of her ancestors and the long lineage of being brave and selfless that they have left for her to find her own courage to stand up for what's right.

A truly moving story that shares author Ellen Oh's deeply personal family history, "Finding Junie Kim" is a must-read for fans of Thanhha Lai and Cynthia Kadohata.