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thewordsdevourer 's review for:
Please Look After Mom
by Kyung-sook Shin
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
It's quite difficult to sum up my mix of emotions towards this book. On one hand, I do think the summary put my hopes up too high, while on the other the book also succeeds exactly what it sets out to do.
Please Look After Mother's simplicity is, in my opinion, its biggest weakness and strength. The story moves along at a leisurely pace w/o any real sense of urgency, and any semblance of excitement is tempered by the fact that the majority of the story happens in the past and ultimately doesn't alter the ultimate outcome of So-nyo's disappearance. This simplicity, however, also underlines the glaringly obvious yet simultaneously unseen and unacknowledged presence and 'being-ness' of mothers, which makes the book's message so searing and searingly frightening.
While the book could certainly have been at least a little more complex or exciting, it still results in altered tangible real life behavior on my part, which might be what matters most.
Please Look After Mother's simplicity is, in my opinion, its biggest weakness and strength. The story moves along at a leisurely pace w/o any real sense of urgency, and any semblance of excitement is tempered by the fact that the majority of the story happens in the past and ultimately doesn't alter the ultimate outcome of So-nyo's disappearance. This simplicity, however, also underlines the glaringly obvious yet simultaneously unseen and unacknowledged presence and 'being-ness' of mothers, which makes the book's message so searing and searingly frightening.
While the book could certainly have been at least a little more complex or exciting, it still results in altered tangible real life behavior on my part, which might be what matters most.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness, Sexism
Moderate: Body horror, Death, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Infidelity, Suicide