Take a photo of a barcode or cover
dark
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
obsession, delusion, and a thin line between internal fantasies and outer reality.
a philosophical exploration of desire and human perception, unraveling how desires are projected to shape one's view of others. the novel captivates with its unique voice—sometimes uncomfortable and requiring time to settle into—yet it draws readers deep into an immense inner world. it prompts reflection on actual realities, from the complex world of idol industry to the subtle projections we cast onto others daily.
yi's writing invites lingering and introspection, offering a narrative that both challenges and mesmerizes.
a philosophical exploration of desire and human perception, unraveling how desires are projected to shape one's view of others. the novel captivates with its unique voice—sometimes uncomfortable and requiring time to settle into—yet it draws readers deep into an immense inner world. it prompts reflection on actual realities, from the complex world of idol industry to the subtle projections we cast onto others daily.
yi's writing invites lingering and introspection, offering a narrative that both challenges and mesmerizes.
challenging
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I cannot emphasize how strange this story is even knowing the premise. At time empathetic and critical, but I feel it haven't gone far enough. I would like other characters beside the protagonist to be a bit more flesh out.
Also no hate to other reviewers because this novel is indeed weird, but complaining about the weirdness as a weak point is not it
Also no hate to other reviewers because this novel is indeed weird, but complaining about the weirdness as a weak point is not it
I knew the boys were performers of supernatural charisma whose concerts would leave a fan permanently destabilized, unable to return to the spiritual attenuation of her daily life. I also knew about the boys' exceptional profundity in matters of the heart, how they offered that same fan her only chance of survival in a world they'd exposed for the risible fraud that it was.
This was on my to-read list as the lowest-rated book, at a whopping 3.17. So naturally I was curious to investigate its contents and see for myself why it's ranked so low. Personally, I think I might have done myself a favor to go into this with low expectations, because I genuinely enjoyed this book so much. But definitely in a "what tf did I just read" kind of way.
The premise of this book is about a young girl in Germany who falls in love with a kpop idol, Moon, after she has the chance to see him live and starts to develop an obsession with finding him, meeting him, and making him understand that their lives are meant to be together. The entirety of this book was fraught with long running monologues, oftentimes detailing the beauty of Moon's neck. The author has a tendency to use very long, running sentences with excessive descriptors and highbrow language, trying to convey that the narrator has a greater - and often pretentious - view of the world. Many reviews found this aspect to make the story unapproachable and unenjoyable - viewing that the author themselves were pretentious - but I see it more that our narrator is the one who thinks and views the world this way and that's why the entirety of the story has such a heavy dreaminess to it. I did find the way the idols talked to be a bit odd, but I'll let it slide for the sake of just wanting to enjoy the story. It's not like we haven't seen celebrities say and do peculiar things a multitude of times in our lives.
However, despite the narrator being a combination of delusional and pretentious - I still found myself relating on some level to the fascination she has for Moon. I too, once dove down the deep cavernous hole that is the kpop genre and I've found myself deeply integrated into that community now. Like her, there's only one kpop idol that I kind of love above the rest - Johnny Suh of NCT - which in the kpop community is known as your 'ultimate bias' - meaning that they will always support and choose that idol over any other idol. It's fairly normal for fans to have biases and ultimate biases. So for our narrator, Moon has become her ultimate bias - perfectly harmless it would seem. She has photocards of him, she watches livestreams of him and interacts in the comments, she starts to write self-insert fanfiction of her and Moon together (also perfectly normal and I loved how she thought this totally original to her until she finds fanfiction on the internet- the poor dear has not had a single original experience in her life). She goes to events where she meets and mingles with others who support the idol group - also something that is perfectly normal and harmless under regular circumstances within the kpop community. Where she and I greatly differ is understanding the difference between idolizing/supporting an idol and wild, uncontrolled obsession that becomes unbridled. Because the final choice she makes is to move to Seoul in hopes of finding him in person.
I think the author, Esther Yi, was very smart to write a story about kpop to suit the themes within the book: of obsession and delusions, forming parasocial relationships with people in unhealthy ways. I've never seen a more delusional community than the kpop community, but I hope anyone who reads this without having experienced kpop knows that we aren't all that way. It's actually a very positive space - I promise!
I found the first half of the book to be more exciting, but then once she arrived in Seoul, things took a bit of a dull turn and started to seem far too easy for our narrator. She conveniently meets people who help her in her search for Moon and before you realize, the story has faded into an unfulfilled ending. Which honestly, is probably the best ending we could get. I would have been really bummed if it had ended with something heavy like murder, kidnapping, or suicide. So maybe just ending it where it did was kind of the point...our unrealistic desires all eventually lead to a sort of unsatisfying realization of dreams that just can't be in our lifetime. Infinite in the negative.
This was on my to-read list as the lowest-rated book, at a whopping 3.17. So naturally I was curious to investigate its contents and see for myself why it's ranked so low. Personally, I think I might have done myself a favor to go into this with low expectations, because I genuinely enjoyed this book so much. But definitely in a "what tf did I just read" kind of way.
The premise of this book is about a young girl in Germany who falls in love with a kpop idol, Moon, after she has the chance to see him live and starts to develop an obsession with finding him, meeting him, and making him understand that their lives are meant to be together. The entirety of this book was fraught with long running monologues, oftentimes detailing the beauty of Moon's neck. The author has a tendency to use very long, running sentences with excessive descriptors and highbrow language, trying to convey that the narrator has a greater - and often pretentious - view of the world. Many reviews found this aspect to make the story unapproachable and unenjoyable - viewing that the author themselves were pretentious - but I see it more that our narrator is the one who thinks and views the world this way and that's why the entirety of the story has such a heavy dreaminess to it. I did find the way the idols talked to be a bit odd, but I'll let it slide for the sake of just wanting to enjoy the story. It's not like we haven't seen celebrities say and do peculiar things a multitude of times in our lives.
However, despite the narrator being a combination of delusional and pretentious - I still found myself relating on some level to the fascination she has for Moon. I too, once dove down the deep cavernous hole that is the kpop genre and I've found myself deeply integrated into that community now. Like her, there's only one kpop idol that I kind of love above the rest - Johnny Suh of NCT - which in the kpop community is known as your 'ultimate bias' - meaning that they will always support and choose that idol over any other idol. It's fairly normal for fans to have biases and ultimate biases. So for our narrator, Moon has become her ultimate bias - perfectly harmless it would seem. She has photocards of him, she watches livestreams of him and interacts in the comments, she starts to write self-insert fanfiction of her and Moon together (also perfectly normal and I loved how she thought this totally original to her until she finds fanfiction on the internet- the poor dear has not had a single original experience in her life). She goes to events where she meets and mingles with others who support the idol group - also something that is perfectly normal and harmless under regular circumstances within the kpop community. Where she and I greatly differ is understanding the difference between idolizing/supporting an idol and wild, uncontrolled obsession that becomes unbridled. Because the final choice she makes is to move to Seoul in hopes of finding him in person.
I think the author, Esther Yi, was very smart to write a story about kpop to suit the themes within the book: of obsession and delusions, forming parasocial relationships with people in unhealthy ways. I've never seen a more delusional community than the kpop community, but I hope anyone who reads this without having experienced kpop knows that we aren't all that way. It's actually a very positive space - I promise!
I found the first half of the book to be more exciting, but then once she arrived in Seoul, things took a bit of a dull turn and started to seem far too easy for our narrator. She conveniently meets people who help her in her search for Moon and before you realize, the story has faded into an unfulfilled ending. Which honestly, is probably the best ending we could get. I would have been really bummed if it had ended with something heavy like murder, kidnapping, or suicide. So maybe just ending it where it did was kind of the point...our unrealistic desires all eventually lead to a sort of unsatisfying realization of dreams that just can't be in our lifetime. Infinite in the negative.
haunting, philosophical, almost steam of consciousness novel from the perspective of a fan who has the terrifying zeal of a convert. i found the interspersions with the Y/N fic itself innovative as an explication of the narrator’s capacious interiority. much of Y/N stares directly at the void of the self, laying it bare. the emotional accounts from the perspective of the fan are particularly compelling and humane, aware of the insanity of the obsession without disrespecting the causes of it.
Dizzying. The protagonists neuroticism is so well displayed through the voice the author uses in this book. It was a very fun read and bled uncertainty of identity and desperation to be understood but also feeling completely un-understandable. Max lent me this book and sometimes we’ll give each other books and be like “yeah this is a very fucking you book” and this is very very much so a max Narotzky book lmao
“I just like the feeling of us moving through time together. I need him there. I need to know that at this very moment he’s looking down at his hands somewhere in the world.”
was tricked by the cover and all i got out of it was bad prose and a horrible plot
I have no idea what I just read but good vibes.