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After reading a memoir at least partly about cruel physical abuse, I now read Korean-born artist Ancco's autobiographical fiction of two girls. The main character is Pearl, who looks back on her chaotic adolescence, where she was wild, stayed out late, and was beaten constantly and brutally by her f Leggi tutto

Pearl is beaten at home, at school, and even by the neighbours and yet still somehow considers herself lucky given the distance of time. Looking back she harbours no ill-will to her father despite the horrific beatings. There is a graphically recounted event involving her father repeatedly smashing

Told from the perspective of an adult South Korean cartoonist reflecting upon her adolescence, this story by an adult South Korean cartoonist gives the impression of autobiography but is apparently fiction. Pearl and Jeong-ae are two teenage girls who have been deemed juvenile delinquents by family, Leggi tutto

Me conmovió un montón esta historia de Ancco y me ha dejado con ganas de leerla más 🥲

amazing.

Han Kang, Min Jin Lee, and Crystal Hana Kim have given us their own unique glimpses into the Korean peninsula's history and present, but few novels of South Korea have gone to so dark a place as Ancco's semi-autobiographical work, Bad Friends. This brief, striking vision of South Korea's early Sixth Leggi tutto

I’m calling it a fictional memoir because the main character is a cartoonist. A gruelling story of violence and abuse which made me wonder about life in Korea — is domestic violence (parents, teachers, friends) really so commonplace? The narrative thrust here was more of a gritty mosaic than an arc Leggi tutto