You could argue that taking your indie DIY music project on a multi-country tour with pay is one of the biggest things you could do. But, while that is a huge thing, I think this might be Michelle Zauner's biggest accomplishment so far. This book hit me hard in the gut. I was hungry for so many things while reading: delicious, spicy, brothy foods and a deeper relationship with my own mother. Zauner writes about losing her mother as not one fast, abrupt thing, but as a slow drawn out process that illnesses like cancer drag on. Her grief is palpable and mutli-faceted. She writes of losing her Korean identity, the cultural knowledge that comes only from having a near and dear relative to share history wtih you. I understand that very well. The way we talk so fluidly in our parent's native tongue only to get to a certain point where there isn't so much to say, because we simply don't know how to say more than what we've rehearsed time and time again. It feels as if we are tresspassers to our own cultural identities. We hope to be accepted by the people who share more deeply an identity to our immigrant parent, but fear that we won't ever be.

This is a beautiful book. Michelle, if you read this, I hear you and I see you and I know. I may be Mexican, and not Korean, but I know. Thank you so very much for writing this incredible book.

And to everyone else, yes, I did stay up late finishing it and ended up eating Kimchi at midnight out of the tub, with chopsticks, over the sink in my underwear.

I felt like I was seeing this book EVERYWHERE so I couldn’t wait to pick it up and it definitely didn’t disappoint. Memoirs aren’t always my favorite genre unless it’s someone famous with a little gossip to spill but this one blew me away. I would recommend it again and again.

This memoir by Michelle Zauner, also known as the musical artist Japanese Breakfast, isn't your typical musician's memoir. It talks a little about her music career, but is primarily focused on losing her mother to cancer, her relationship to her Korean heritage, and the food that tied it all together. It's a vulnerable, emotional, and deeply human story of grief and its impact on identity. Food is described in the book as almost its own character, something Zauner turned to for help, for healing, and for her own history. I loved every word.

This book made me want to connect with my mom, someone I haven't had a close relationship with in over a decade. Very powerful to read this going into Mother's Day weekend. A very sad by satisfying ending. The narrator is cathartically emotional and never shies away from showing herself in a bad light. This work of art is a testament to the mother that inspired it.

4.5 stars

An incredibly vulnerable recount of memories and wounds. It made me just ... I needed to hug my own mum after reading this book.
We start with such honest recounts and emotions from Michelle about her relationship between so many things; future, past, family, mother, Asian culture, food, & death. Grief isn't just being sad, and Michelle made sure we felt it all; anger, resentment, desperation & hope and this was what hit me the hardest in this book.
This was perfect, and even though I am asked to rate it, it almost feels bad too. As this was so raw and such a personal book, I'm just grateful to have been allowed to read it.

Thank you, NetGalley, Knopf Publishing Group & Michelle Zauner. I have never been so happy to be allowed to read a personal experience. All this is my own opinion!

I really enjoyed Crying in H Mart. I loved all the references to food and the deeper family story and connections. Michelle Zauner's honest and open writing style was a plus for me. I appreciated the pacing of the story and the rawness. I loved how there was some comic relief woven into a story with a lot of difficult topics, like a parent's cancer diagnosis and treatment. This book is a coming-of-age mixed with Zauner realizing what really matters, which was heartening to read in these challenging times of pandemic.

How. Dare. She.
Be this good at writing AND be a musician and be gorgeous. Ridiculous. I was rapt the entire way through. And very hungry for Korean food.

Crying in H Mart is a touching and heartfelt memoir about the wonderful and complicated relationship between the author and her late mother. Food was one of the things that connected Zauner to her mom and her Korean culture. She takes you into her grief as she struggles with her mom's cancer diagnosis and ultimately her death. A devastating and beautiful read.

Thank you to Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my review.

I cried several times while reading this book. The last time, at the very end, I cried so much into the first Korean food I had eaten in 9 years. This book was heartbreaking for me because the love that Michelle felt for her mother was the same I felt for my grandfather, and I felt we were grieving at the same time. It was similar, but different. I noticed so many feelings and emotions that were buried deep within bubbling to the surface while reading this beautiful memoir of loss, loss, and life. I'm grateful to Michelle for telling her story, and for this book, to which I feel gave me the opportunity and space to grieve for my grandfather. This one is staying on the shelf, while I purchase other copies for friends who are experiencing grief and loss.

Part an account of her mother’s unfortunate death and part food memoir, Michelle Zauner’s “Crying in H Mart” links how food is inextricably tied to her mother and memories of her Korean-American mother are just as tangled in food. She describes the joy they both found in the contrasts and complements of Korean cuisine with infectious delight—no dish goes uneaten, no flavors undescribed.

After Zauner’s mother told her that she was dying of stomach cancer, she spent as much time as possible with her, with the goal to support her as much as she herself was supported. She casts an unflinching eye to the relationship between herself and her mother, who was highly critical and said shockingly hurtful things to her daughter. She shines a spotlight on her own less-than-perfect behavior as well, revealing, no surprise: a typical mother-daughter relationship, full of hurt and heart-stopping love.

Zauner, who greatly regrets her poor Korean-language skills and inability to cook Korean food, hoped to learn as much as she could about cooking Korean food to nourish her mother’s body and soul. But Mrs. Zauner was too ill to cook, and a friend of her mother shut Zauner and her father off from a closer connection to her. She ends up learning how to make authentic dishes by watching the YouTube channel of a Korean-American home cook. (The inspired reader is likely to make her way there as well.)

Although Zauner seems selfish at times, particularly in planning a trip to Korea that her mother was clearly not well enough to enjoy, and getting married to her boyfriend Peter in her mother’s final days, she almost desperately explains how she hoped those things would raise her mother’s spirits and distract them all from the horror of her impending death. Like many adults, Zauner behaves like a child around her parents, and they revert to their past roles—critical mother, provocative teenager, distant father. No one knew that better than her mother. “‘When you were a child, you always used to cling me. Everywhere we went,’ my mother whispered, struggling to get the words out. ‘And now that you’re older, here you are—still clinging to me.’”


Inevitably, the ones we love the most have the ability to hurt us the most. Zauner writes, “There was no one in the world that was ever as critical or could make me feel as hideous as my mother, but there was no one, not even Peter, who ever made me feel as beautiful.” Her enthusiastic prose may be over-laden with adjectives, but what hurtles through the page is her earnestness and honesty. At a time when the United States is reckoning with anti-Asian racism, books like Zauner’s and the story of her lived experience as a Korean-American feels vitally important.

Those familiar with her musical career may be surprised that she rarely mentions her band, Japanese Breakfast. The indie band is receiving national attention and even a recent booking on “The Tonight Show.” A wider audience has led to greater visibility of not just the band but the overlooked human being that she is—a role she takes seriously. “After the shows, I’d sell shirts and copies of the record, oftentimes to other mixed kids and Asian Americans who, like me, struggled to find artists who looked like them, or kids who had lost their parents who would tell me how the songs had helped them in some way, what my story meant to them.” What a brilliant way to connect the reader to her story, using food, the sights and smells we all have in our lives, the scents that a mere whiff of in the grocery store will lead to tears.

“Crying in H Mart”
By Michelle Zauner
Knopf, 256 pages

This honest and illuminating memoir really captured the complexity and enormity of grief. Zauner brought her mother to life through vivid descriptions of her skincare routines, parenting style, and, of course, her cooking. She described all of the food and ingredients so beautifully that I found myself searching for recipes as I read along. Not only was I introduced to Zauner's mother and her lovely family, but also to a culture and cuisine that I did not know much about. You do not have to be a fan of Japanese Breakfast to be truly moved by this memoir, but I'm sure you will be once you have read it. For fans of Rick Bragg's The Best Cook in The World and Tung Nguyen's Mango and Peppercorns.

QUICK TAKE: warning: do not read this book on an empty stomach, because there is a LOT of talk about food in this emotional and well-written memoir about a Korean-American woman who puts her life on pause to come home and care for her ailing mother. Family is complicated, and I feel like while my life experiences are nothing like the author's, I was still able to easily relate to her struggles and family drama, and I ultimately really loved so much about this book. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to find my nearest H Mart.

This is obviously a heart-felt memoir of a young woman’s struggle to come to terms with her mother’s cancer diagnosis and death. Her descriptions of her feelings are passionate and well-written. I realize that she is trying to reconnect with her Korean heritage through the cuisine but, my goodness! It seems like a third of the book was lists of food! I also wish she could have included her husband more in the story instead of him seeming like an afterthought.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf Random House for the ARC to read and review.

Wow I really loved this book. The subject matter is sad. Michelle depicts her relationship with her mother growing up, the traumatic experience of losing her to cancer, and the process of grief she goes through in the years afterwards.

Michelle’s exploration of her relationship with her mother is described through food. So much memory and connection is found in food, and you really felt that in this book. It’s definitely a very personal depiction and is more about her side of the relationship, rather than her mother’s. Even though it’s one-sided, her experience of grief is universal and I connected with a lot of it.

Michelle Zauner writes about losing her Mom to cancer, what it was like to grow up Korean-American, how she connects to her family through food (and discovers this while caring for her mother.)

Near the end of the book she talks about finally finding success as a musician, which she never expected, in her band called Japanese Breakfast. The cover of Psychopomp has her mother reaching a hand out.

I was expecting something a bit lighter, maybe a bit more snappy, but I also enjoy grief memoirs, so even though it was slower paced than I expected, I felt a true sense of the author by the end. I also liked hearing her stories about Eugene, Oregon, since that's not too far from where I grew up. I may have spent some time watching the food YouTube videos she mentions, and reading articles about the many H Marts in Oregon. My youngest sister took me to a Korean market in Beaverton that had Koreans upstairs and a kimchee tasting table, but I don't think it was an H Mart.

This is a such a lovely and sad memoir about grief, family, and identity. It beautifully portrays the complicated relationship that can exist between a mother and a daughter. The connection between food and family is felt throughout.

Japanese Breakfast's album 'Psychopomp' explored Michelle Zauner's grief over her mother's death through music. 'Crying in H Mart' made that exploration through food.

At once lively and poignant, Zauner's memoir proves that her talents extend far beyond singing and songwriting. Her narrative style is conversational: she seems to have a discussion with the reader about her experiences, allowing them to feel her emotions through her words. The language used is eloquent, seemingly effortless, and conveys each fact of Zauner's life clearly.

If the cover and blurb weren't indications enough, food makes for a very important theme in this memoir, tying every single memory together with a discernible thread. When food is abundant, eaten with relish, there is happiness in the household, a ceasefire between mother and daughter. When someone refuses to eat (or is unable to do so), it is obvious that the order of Michelle's world has been upturned and that something is very, very wrong. The dishes themselves are described with great care: their names and backgrounds, how they're made, how they're eaten. You can almost taste them alongside the author as you read along.

Zauner chooses to present her life in fragments. One moment, you're in the middle of reading about her mother's illness; in the next, you're thrown into a flashback of her mother's siblings when young, through a photograph that is one of Zauner's few ties to her mother's past. These changes in scene are often sudden and unexpected, but when you get used to them – when you start to expect them – they stop being so surprising.

A memoir isn't exactly the easiest thing to review: this isn't a story with characters and plot, this is a written representation of a part of someone's life as they saw it. That being said, I can speak for its writing, and that writing is very, very good.

Happy publication day!

Crying in H Mart is the memoir of Michelle Zauner, a singer who records under the name Japanese Breakfast. While the book does chronicle her interest in music and her eventual rise to fame, it is primarily a story of her relationship with her mother, food, and her Korean heritage. Crying in H Mart refers to her grief in the wake of her mother's death; everything in H Mart (a well known chain of Korean grocery stores) reminds her of her late mother.

I really enjoyed Zauner's frank and honest portrayals of her relationships with her Korean mother and Jewish American father. She also uses food as a link to everything in her life- the dishes that she ate in Korea with her family, the food that her mom prepared when she was a child, her own forays into Korean cooking as her mother gets progressively weaker. It was at times difficult and painful to read about her mother's last days, but it was written well. My only complaint is that the beginning is a bit disjointed and difficult to follow because of the timeline jumps. However, the story becomes more cohesive towards the end of the book.

Overall, I thought this was a thought provoking, fairly short read. I definitely recommend giving it a try!

After finishing Crying In H Mart, I had to sit with my emotions for a few days before writing this review. Zauner's debut memoir is at once raw, vulnerable, and deeply necessary. Because of how close the books subject matter was to me as a Korean American, it's difficult to encapsulate everything I felt while reading this book in this review.

I've enjoyed Zauner's lyrics as part of Japanese Breakfast, and it was refreshing to see her writing in a different medium. She share deeply personal parts of her life, some unflattering, without navel-gazing or putting others down. All at once this book was a warm embrace, a reassurance, a message of heartbreak, and a chance for a new start.

Thank you NetGalley and Knopf for providing a free advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

"Save your tears for when your mother dies."

Beautiful, vulnerable, and intensely relatable, Crying in H Mart had me crying from the first pages all the way through to the end. Michelle Zauner's words carry a depth of emotion I can barely only begin to conceive within myself, and every word rings true. Touching on intimate matters of biracial identity and what it means to be connected to the culture or the world of either of your parents, what it means to develop your own identity in the midst of parental expectations, the awkwardness of role reversal when you find yourself caring your parents as their independence wanes, the struggles to orient yourself within your peer group after a foundational experience they are unlikely to experience for decades, and the heaviness of the realization that you were only just beginning to get the know your parent as actual person when they are taken away from you so soon, no single work has hit me this hard in the last decade.

Zauner's narrative style is exceptionally organized with an easy flow that makes it hard to put down, as heavy and painful as it gets sometimes. Food weaves a strong guiding thread through the book that makes the story feel complete. In some chapters, Zauner highlights dishes that bring a cultural connection between mothers and daughters (e.g., miyeok guk, which mothers are encouraged to eat for postpartum recovery and children on their birthdays to honor their mothers); in others, she illustrates her mother's decline in vitality through a loss of appetite and contraction of her palate. It is a magnificent exposition of the way food can build relationships and strengthen bonds--or, in some cases, drive a wedge through an already strained relationship.

"I wondered if the 10 percent she kept from the three of us who knew her best--my father, Nami, and me--had all been different, a deception according to a pattern that together we could recompose. I wondered if I could ever know all of her, what other threads she'd left behind to pull."

What hit me hardest about Zauner's narrative was the urgency with which she yearned to know her mother better by the end. Losing a parent at 25, it's easy to get caught up on what your parent is going to miss in your life, such as with Zauner's rush to get married before her mother passes and her desire for her mom to bear witness to and share in the success of her music career. But what you often overlook, at least for the first few years, is what you didn't get the chance to see of your parent's life. What you didn't get to understand or know about who they are as a person, their deepest pains and fears, the intensity of their love for you. Like Zauner, I lost my mother in my early 20s, and it's not until you start to really become an adult yourself that you realize just how little you know about your parents as actual people; and in those cases, there's no one really around to ask anymore. It was such a beautiful and moving moment for me to see Zauner connect with her aunt in Seoul, despite the language barrier, and begin to see her mom in a new light, and to understand her just a little better.

My truest thanks to NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group for the eARC in exchange for the review; I'll be cooking Indonesian food and on the phone with my aunt every evening for the foreseeable future if anyone needs me. Highly recommend to anyone with a relationship with their mother.