A review by soupstix
If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha

challenging dark emotional hopeful slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

cw: mentions of sexual assault, suicide, miscarriages

untagged spoilers ahead!

between this and my enjoyment of “before the coffee gets cold” by toshikazu kawaguchi, i’m starting to think my niche is melancholy, loosely-connected, multi-pov novels where the characters’ connections trace back to one location, haha…

“if i had your face” by frances cha is a dark slice-of-life story following four women—or five, depending on how you look at it—as they struggle with misogyny, class, beauty standards, marriage, even parasocial relationships, and more.

cha has a simple writing style which is nonetheless powerful as i found myself engaged with each of the uniquely tragic stories of each woman as they underwent their individual struggles. although each story felt distinct, there was a common thread of beauty and its link to status.

ara is a mute hairstylist with surprising bite to her despite her demureness and an obsession with kpop idol, taein. ara grew up with a lowly reputation due to her parents’ status and ended up dear friends with sujin, another outcast (this time, for being an orphan). ara and sujin’s childhood/teenage years are characterized by recklessness and violence, up until the fight that took ara’s voice and nearly her life. ara’s edges are softened out by her inability to verbally express herself as easily, but she often ends up mistreated by those around her because she’s simultaneously mute and also very normal looking. as someone who’s an idol fan myself, i found myself fascinated with the idol-obsessed aspect of ara’s personality, how she uses it to cope with the meager state of her life, and how it all comes bitterly crashing down with their one interaction.

kyuri, i believe, is the character that people would unanimously agree has the strongest character arc and most compelling storyline. kyuri is a room salon girl—essentially a prostitute—with an ailing mother she sends all her money to and stacks of debt. kyuri has gotten every plastic surgery procedure in the book, resulting in a stunningly attractive woman who knows how to navigate her away around sleazy men. while most people view kyuri as materialistic and vain—and she is to an extent—she’s mostly just painfully aware of how her beauty is the only thing that allows her to get anywhere…and the onset of her inevitable decay. despite her jadedness and meanness, kyuri has a mostly warm camaraderie with the girls in her building that eventually leads to sujin advocating for her to find a job elsewhere. kyuri, who never thought she could become anything else, agrees to try. amidst the dark backdrop of kyuri’s life, this ending is hopeful.

miho is an orphan who studied at university in new york on a scholarship and was subsequently integrated into a circle of rich students. notably, her best friend ruby, who had committed suicide. she nurses a guilty conscience after falling in love with ruby’s boyfriend when she was alive, hanbin, and getting into a relationship with him after her death. miho’s pov was interesting to me because she’s the most innocent of all the pov characters. she has the most pure curiosity when it comes to beautiful, historical things and she views everything—including her friends—through the lens of an artist who captures the grimness of life and the rawness of emotions. this might be because miho never had to get work done to be considered conventionally beautiful and she’s also the only one of the girls with genuine proximity to wealth, so she enjoys a certain amount of privilege that lets her be more innocent. although she starts off a very passive character who ping-pongs with the whims of those around her, she eventually develops more agency, especially when it comes to hanbin.

wonna is slightly older than the others, married and trying for children despite being strapped for cash and having a history of miscarrying. wanna’s pov was the most disjointed from the others, not really interacting with them until near the end of the book. but i thought she was an interesting addition who did serve a purpose. she was an outsider looking in for a period of time, jealous of the women living above her who seemed to act so freely. while the others are weighed down by the baggage of their pasts, wonna still looks to the future—her child—and thus adds an interesting balance to the novel.

sujin is not a pov character, but she does have an important role. as ara’s childhood best friend, she often serves as ara’s voice in difficult times. for kyuri, she sees how kyuri is mistreated by her madam and is the push for change in kyuri’s life. and for miho, she helps plot out miho’s revenge on hanbin for being a cheat. i see why people would have wanted her to be a pov character, but i also understand why she isn’t.

the men in this book are usually antagonists. the women aren’t necessarily better people, but their stories are greatly weighed down by the misogyny and classism each have to face and never truly overcome.

there is no “satisfying” ending to this story, but i liked that there wasn’t. there are also many questions raised throughout each woman’s chapters that never fully get answered and depths cha could’ve gotten into with each issue she addressed. but i view this book as a series of snapshots into the daily lives of these women who are bogged down to the extreme by these awful aspects of society, and how the rest of their lives go is up to the reader’s interpretation.

this was an incredible debut and i can’t wait to see what frances cha writes next!

old review:
[jo march voice] women!!!!!!!!!
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