Great for people interested in exploring the Korean- American experience. This is the beautifully told story of a daughter learning about her mother after her death.

Margot and her mother have a huge communication gap, cultural and linguistic. Upon finding her mother has died, Margot seeks to unfurl both her mother’s life and her mysterious death.

I enjoyed the novel, especially at the end when the author pulls it all together and brings Closure to both Margot and the reader.

Thank you Netgalley for for this ARC.

I enjoy mother-daughter relationship books, especially those with an immigrant backstory or working class families. This one really delved right in and even had some mystery to it, thanks to her mom's unexpected death. I felt like the story didn't gel 100% but I enjoyed the writing and was glad I read it.

A wonderful debut novel so involving .Characters are well drawn theirs family romance mystery &korean food.Perfect combination before a wonderful read.A book I will be recommending.#netgalley#randomhouse

Picked this up because I’m always interested in immigrant narratives; unfortunately this felt poorly written to me.

Full disclosure: I was in a writing workshop with the author of this book, and read/critiqued an early draft of the first couple chapters.

Wow! Even though i had some foreknowledge about the premise of this book and some of its characters, it did not "spoil" any of the book for me. Just based on the description, i would have wanted to read this even if i had no prior knowledge of the story or the author. I love books with a plot that spans generations in a family like this, where the reader is bounced back and forth between the ancestor's story and the descendent's story.

This is sort of a murder mystery, and sort of a puzzle about Margot's family history, woven together into an engrossing novel that kept my attention and made me want to both read it nonstop and parcel it out to savor the chapters slowly. It's the first book i've been able to concentrate on and really fall into since this pandemic began, and I loved the way i could fall into Mina's world of the past and Margot's contemporary worlds.

A wonderful trip to LA's Koreatown of the past and present, at a time where no one can travel anywhere other than in a book.

The last page made me cry, but good-cry. A good cry in these dark days was a beautiful gift.

Why are mother daughter relationships so problematic? Compound that with an immigrant mother who fled Korea during the Korean War , and an American born girl, and trouble is doubled. Margo is the 26 year old daughter of Mina Lee who has still not learned to speak English. Margo is ashamed of their poverty, their house, and all the trappings that came with her mother's undocumented status. Her mother was burdened with her own history and grief, which she could never emote. It always rose to the surface, but remained buried with her dreams as she tried to provide steadiness and pragmatism for Margot and for herself. Margot lately had been calling her mother but had gotten no answer. When she traveled from Seattle to LA, she finds her mother dead on the floor in her apartment. Was this just an accident or was foul play involved? This is not a mystery in the traditional sense but a teasing out of Mina's background story alternating with Margot's questioning of the present day situation. Food plays a huge role in the book, suggesting a means of stability, love and safety between the characters. The book has a languid pace and I didn't feel a huge attachment for the characters despite the circumstances of their life. It was enjoyable but I wished there was more depth to the novel.

I really enjoyed this book. The timeline was easy to follow even though it was told from different perspectives and different eras. The whole story came together perfectly. This book is a bit family drama, a bit love story and a bit mystery/detective story. I loved the characters and the author's writing style (descriptive but not TOO wordy). I appreciated that it was not predictable where it easily could have been (the relationship between Margot and officer Choi is one example). There was also some humor in this book and I am still chuckling about the conversation between Margo and her friend Miguel when she tells him that a body was found but the animals had eaten part of it. SO funny!

I went to look for other books by this author only to realize that this was her debut novel. I will definitely be adding her to my list of "must read" authors.

Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the advance copy of this book.

The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim is the tale of a mother and daughter and the distance that’s always lived between them. When Margot surprises her mother with an unexpected visit, she instead discovers her mother’s dead body. What happened to Mina Lee? And who was she before she became the woman Margot knew only from a distance?

This story is a little reminiscent of Celeste Ng and Jean Kwok, as all three authors explore mother-daughter relationships, often in the difficult landscape of immigrants parenting their American born children. The juxtaposition of the kind of life each generation leads and how that impacts their perception of each other allows the reader to walk a mile in each character’s shoes, learning more about the unexpected hardships immigrants and their families face. A common theme amongst these authors is the difficulty of having one foot in each culture and constantly being torn in different directions.

This dual narrative, multi-timeline novel explores this and more. The past and present are neatly woven together, as both mother and daughter lament their distant relationship but also lack the knowledge and language to fix it. As Margot discovers more about her mother’s past and motivations, her mother’s behavior begins to make more sense.

This novel was filled with interesting characters. The true main character may, in fact, be food. Korean food plays its own large role in this novel, serving to connect disconnected characters from each other and the place they miss. The descriptions of food are sure to make your stomach growl, so read with a snack handy or search out a Korean restaurant in your area to get takeout from to enjoy while reading the book!

I loved how the author used food to set the environment and draw reclusive characters together. Although Mina failed to connect with Margot on many levels, she gave her the gift of Korean food to comfort her.

Margot playing detective to solve her mother’s death forces her to reassess her own life and goals, and pushes her outside of her comfort zone. In learning more about her mother’s life, she learns more about herself and her family.

This novel has a leisurely pace despite the time jumps. Although events unfold slowly, when they do occur it is sudden and fierce. This parallels nicely with the characters, who find their gumption right when they need it the most.

I’m thankful to NetGalley for providing an ARC such that I could review this novel.

The Last Story of Mina Lee release September 8, 2020.