Glad I finally took the time to read this translated sci fi collection. My favorite was definitely his and her letters in I’m waiting for you.

I've been trying to find a way to articulate my thoughts on I'M WAITING FOR YOU since I finished it last year. On the surface, I couldn't think of a solid reason to dislike the collection. I could say that a great majority of the stories, objectively speaking, were good. And yet, I couldn't say that I truly loved this collection -- and, upon further thought, I felt like I liked the collection less and less. I didn't want to write a review until I felt that I could pin the reason down.

I realized today: the stories in I'M WAITING FOR YOU read like sections of a movie, arranged without context; disjointed. Some are good, but don't last long enough to fully envelope the reader, rather leaving the reader feeling like they were on the edge of something they could never truly experience. In other words, I often ended each story feeling largely dissatisfied, something that may have been remedied had the stories been slightly longer. Alternatively, other stories felt like the longer parts of movies that seem to stretch onwards indefinitely; it seemed like the story would never end.

With pacing being issue, as well as the writing style being detached, I found it hard to be truly immersed within the stories contained inside this collection -- and that is why, despite interesting concepts and skillful structure, I found it impossible to truly love any of these stories.

This was a fantastic book. Can’t wait to read more by the author and hope this one becomes a movie! Lots of mind pondering about life as we know it. And what we think we know. Definitely speaks to the human condition. Heady and introspective. Great book.

This is a collection of four stories that are related to each other in pairs. The collection is bookended by two stories that are letters from one half of a romantic couple to the other as they are separated across time and waiting for each other. The middle two stories are about god-like beings that control the planet and treat it as a way to learn about the meaning of the universe.

This is an excellent collection of short stories. I generally liked the epistolary nature of the first and last story. And they are romantic and tragic in a unique and yet at the same time, timeless, way. The almost inconceivable commitment of the two to their relationship is endearing and makes your heart hurt for the tragedy and the hope of love.

The center two stories really are about relating to one another and trying to understand the meaning of being and the rebelling against what is thought to be the one true way and how to determine what is a one true way. And this is a kind of abstract philosophical story that always appeals to me. Overall, highly recommend!

Thank you to @netgalley , @avonbooks, and @harpervoyagerUS for the gifted copy!

Not my usual style of reading but I was pleasantly surprised. I love when stories play with the idea of time and moving from one timeline to the next. Very interesting concept and very well written

I'm Waiting for You was a different experience. I was a bit frustrated with the stories in the middle, mostly because they were likely over my head. I think I was able to grasp some of the themes about existence with the world really a place for experiential learning. The Author's Notes were helpful. The stories that served as bookends were easier to comprehend with two individuals running into hurdles as they try to meet each other for their wedding; love transcends time. Interestingly, as with much of the science fiction literature I've run into, I would have greatly enjoyed this as something to be watched as opposed to something to read.

This is a mind-expanding collection of speculative fiction formed by two pairs of interconnected stories which Bo-young explores the driving forces of humanity - love, hope, relationship, creation, destruction, identity and the search for the meaning of existence.

In "I'm waiting for you" and "On my way to you", it is a story about a groom and a bride who will get married after they are back from their space voyage. We get to see different perception of time and space (since the bride would have to wait 4 months and the groom, 4 and half years to see each other again) and some things happen like delay and stellar system travel. Both collections contain letters between the couple and reading them made me feel less attached to the material things and value person/sentiments. Ultimately, it left me sad and hopeful.

In "The prophet of corruption" and "That one life", it is rather an elaborative worldbuilding where people forge bonds, merge (with people or inanimate things) and divide into different entities. While in the Dark Realm (world of the dead), it is debated teaching methods, there's a reincarnation training which students are sent to the world of living (Lower Realm) to go through tests in order to learn lessons. Dark Realm doesn't intervene with Lower Realm and both have different perspectives of the meaning of life.
Bo-young paints meaningful observations on the existentialism, using complex concepts involving religion, prophets, realm, disciple, corruption and next life that brought me a philosophical and spiritual experience. I recognized some sci-fi/fantasy elements also shared in Chinese mythology while there were unexpected new concepts that fascinated me. If you are not used to reading very abstract ideas, you might find it a bit hard to digest.

In short, I found this collection utterly refreshing, thought-provoking and I was overall very satisfied. I would highly recommend it to readers who love a well-written sci-fi or those wanting to read incredible unique stories.

"I'm Waiting for You and Other Stories", by Kim Bo-young, translated into English by Sophie Bowman and Sung Ryu, and published by Harper Voyager, is a collection of four stories, connected in pairs. The first and last stories, "I'm Waiting for You" and "On My Way" are two interconnected love stories, about a bride and groom travelling through the galaxy, coordinating their arrival on Earth for their wedding. Things do not go as planned, and the two lovers are lost from each other in time and space. The stories are told in letters the lovers are writing to each other, where they express their unwavering love to each other and try to hold on to every shred of hope. I really enjoyed these two stories and felt they were very sweet. There were also some graphic features in the book that helped emphasize some aspects of these two stories that I found to be pretty cool.

The second and third stories, "The Prophet of Corruption and "That One Life", were interesting in concept, but in execution went a bit over my head. They are set in a world where humanity only exists as different manifestations of certain deity beings referred to as prophets. The more that prophets identify themselves as individuals, the more corrupt they become. In order to no longer be corrupt, they need to merge with the entities they originated from and renounce their individualism. I felt there was probably a lot related to Korean mythology (which was also mentioned in a bunch of reviews) that I was not familiar with, so that probably affected my reading experience. Overall, I think the stories were good, just not quite for me. Also, based on the author's notes, the middle stories seem to be connected to other stories that are yet to be translated into English, so it partly feels like judging them out of context

What I absolutely loved were the author's, translators', and original readers' notes. The stories behind how the stories came to life were so cute and fascinating, and it made me happy to have read the stories, even if they didn't all quite feel like they were for me. . Overall I enjoyed the collection and am curious to read more by Kim Bo-young. Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Voyager for the e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

I’m Waiting for You and Other Stories by Kim Bo-Young is a collection of three science fiction short stories that are interwoven together in an untraditional format-the title story starts the collection and then is broken up into two segments so that the second half ends the collection. All three stories were originally published separately in South Korea, meaning that I suppose the US publication editors were trying to freshen them up with a new format.

Science fiction is outside of my comfort zone and my thought while reading the first story was -oh this is accessible for people new to the genre. The concept of each story is very interesting on the surface (time travel, creators looking at the universe), but by the second story I found myself feeling bored and confused by some of the more fantastical elements and ended up choosing not to finish the collection.

Included in Washington Post column April 6, 2021 https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/lets-talk-about-the-best--and-newest--science-fiction-and-fantasy-story-collections/2021/04/05/7c7801ac-92fb-11eb-a74e-1f4cf89fd948_story.html

I was so excited to receive an early e-galley of this collection of stories from one of South Korea's preeminent science fiction writers! I absolutely loved the opening titular story, "I'm Waiting for You," and its companion story "On My Way," which is the fourth and final one in this collection. These two stories explore love and commitment amidst the background of a near future world where space/time travel is possible, leading to a somewhat more distant future (though not that distant!) of climate change and human-made disaster. I was amazed at how much we see of this world through letters between two lovers who are separated by continuous challenges as well as by their connection and commitment to each other despite these increasingly difficult obstacles.

Unfortunately, the middle two stories - "The Prophet of Connection" and "That One Life" - completely went over my head. These felt like they were written by a different author entirely. The overall concept is interesting - god-like beings reign over a world where everything is an extension of their will, leading to complex philosophical ruminations - but unfortunately these were too complex for me. I do think that avid science fiction readers will appreciate and enjoy them, though. I'm interested to see what else Kim Bo-Young has written, given how different these stories were!

As I dive deeper and deeper into science fiction as a genre, I’ve felt a much more intense need to read short stories. Much like the novella, there is so much more room to be sharper, snappier, and fulfill a theme in novel ways. Unfortunately, it’s very hard to review short stories. Collections help sometimes, allowing you to dig into the ones you particularly enjoyed, but I always feel weird about leaving out some of the ones I liked, but didn’t hit as hard. Luckily, Kim Bo-young’s collection I’m Waiting for You and Other Stories is not a large compilation, but a small grouping of four stories. Better yet, the stories are paired off, making the sinews of the book much stronger and more interesting than most collections. It helps that it is wonderfully translated by Sophie Bowman and Sung Ryu.

The stories that really stood out to me were the first and fourth, which are interconnected in a big way. They tell the tale of two nameless people whose love is literally star-crossed. In I’m Waiting For You, the groom embarks on a short two month trip as he awaits his fiancée. Unfortunately, she is in another star system, and he takes a relativistic trip so that he will arrive on Earth the same time his bride will, in four years time. The story is told through a series of letters he sends her about the trip, and the troubles he runs into. Time goes awry, and he continues to write his letters and broadcast them to space as years, decades, and even millenia pass by. Its companion story, On My Way is from the bride’s perspective as she encounters her own problems getting to Earth, causing her groom to continually update his plans until they lose touch.

For me, these two stories are the selling point of the book. Time dilation and relativity are such interesting subjects, and rarely are they used to such a grand effect. Kim does an excellent job of playing with the trope, and making it such an incredibly personal tale. Each letter feels heavier, as if they are continuously harder to write. Kim’s portrayal of the groom’s story is powerful, with a sharp focus on his increasing isolation and detachment from time. The only thing he really is holding on to is the insane hope that he may meet his bride, no matter how improbable it is. On the other hand, the bride’s story is less grim, focusing instead on how she tries to build a life while making her way to him. Unfortunately, she realizes she can’t commit to a world she has no stake in, opting to leave the group she’s been with in order to find her groom. They are both incredible stories that fit nicely together, with an incredible amount of depth between them. Just writing about them makes me want to pick it up and reread them.

The other two stories are a little different and definitely harder to explain. The Prophet of Corruption and That One Life take place outside of human existence. Instead, they are told from the perspective of godlike creatures who have total control over the lives of people on Earth. These Gods are also spawn of each other, split off like cells as new ideas are formed by their “prophets.” Wayward “children” are consumed and reappropriated to the whole, while larger accumulations hold more sway of what is deemed correct and what is corrupt.

Where I’m Waiting for You is sweet, Corruption is intense. Kim dives deep in these two stories playing around with ideas of destruction, creation and free will, to say the least. They are drawn out discussions on the nature of corruption, who gets to decide what is right and wrong. Sometimes these discussions are then played out in thought experiments. Prophets send their pupils to live amongst humanity, within a human body in order to learn life’s lessons. Occasionally, they live a quiet painless life, but more often they are sent to inhabit grueling circumstances that you wouldn’t wish upon your worst enemy. It’s an interesting story, one I wish to reread to gain a fuller broader understanding of. Kim very cleverly builds a reality that is tough to conceptualize, but easy to relate to. She utilizes the short story format to its fullest extent here, exploring complex topics in a concentrated and tight narrative that solidifies her themes. It is definitely worth picking up alongside the others, but I recommend taking your time and really soaking in it.

Rating: I’m Waiting for You and Other Stories 8.5/10
-Alex

I'M WAITING FOR YOU AND OTHER STORIES - Kim Bo-Young
Harper Voyager
ASIN: B08CR6J7XN
ISBN-10: 0-06295-146-7
ISBN-13: 978-0-06295-146-5
April 6, 2021
General Fiction & Sci-Fi/Fantasy

Author Kim Bo Young mixes science with fantasy and mythology to create evocative and very original stories about what might have been, what is, and how time and place can change everything.

The first short story, "I'm Waiting for You," is told through a series of letters. While the characters' names are never given, an engaged young man and woman travel on different ships through space to meet in a church on Earth for their wedding. However, lightspeed and relativity dramatically slow time from Earth time, and during their travels, things go awry. Time changes dramatically for both of them. Can they ever meet up? When will this happen? It is an amazing story of abiding love. At the end of the stories in "On My Way to You," the woman tells her story in letters to her love

In between the two stories "The Prophet of Corruption" tells the story of immortal beings as exposed by the Prophet Naban. The Prophets' separation began the universe. Throughout time each Prophet has divided into more beings, or children, and while it takes energy from their bodies, the Prophets remain as individuals. These children can also separate and merge. The Prophets, and all of their children, periodically go to the Lower Realm, losing all memory in order to live different lives each time. When in the Lower Realm they eventually die and return to the Dark Realm and constantly repeat the process, gaining more knowledge each time once they are back in the Dark Realm. Interestingly, in the Dark Realm, they are not addressed by individual pronouns, but as plurals for all the lives they have lived in the Lower Realm. Sometimes in the Lower Realm, those who are separations of the same being can be a mother, father, sibling, child, or lover to that being. Yet, a question arises if this is a blameless thing to do to all the life on the Lower Realm. Yes, the Lower Realm was made from the immortals' will, but now some think it should remain without interference from the Dark Realm. This belief is considered a perversion and corruption. Naban is one of the original Prophets, the second generation separation of Aisata, who is no more. Naban knows her child, the third generation Aman, is corrupt. What can she do?

Along with these stories are a series of notes by the author and the translator. Reading The Prophet of Corruption Glossary at the back of the book before starting the story can give readers some insights into the names used. For instance, in Korean, the Dark Realm is the world of the dead. The Lower Realm is the world of the living. Knowing some of these meanings helps give the reader a deeper understanding of the story.

I'm Waiting For You
By Kim Bo-Young

There are four stories in this collection, that while the first and the last are interconnected, each of these stories are just as exciting to read.

In “I’m Waiting for You” I found that this speculative fiction is disguised as a love story, originally intended as a commission to be used as a proposal to be read aloud. This is a series of fifteen letters written to his fiancée while aboard on an intended eight week journey in space that will culminate to his wedding venue at the end of the journey.

But the journey is miscalculated and years pass while South Korea and Earth becomes uninhabitable and the journey continues as time continue to move forward - though throughout, his love remains hopeful and timeless. The final story, “On My Way,” is the series of fifteen letters, now from her point of view of her unwavering love despite the disastrous trip.

This anthology is a true work of art full of thematically mind bending philosophical questions of who we are and what love is, in an infinite and timeless reality.

I found this to be just a beautiful read!

I loved the different points of view in the book. It was so beautiful written I am glad I got a chance to read it seeing as it isn't my typical genre of books. I loved learning how the different stories come together! Thank you for providing me with a copy

This book consists of two pairs of stories by a South Korean author known for her speculative fiction. Both deal with a sort of time-is-relative theory, though in very different ways.

The first and last stories are from the perspective of an engaged couple. One is traveling back from Alpha Centauri, so rather than wait the few years for her to return, the other decides to board a spaceship that’ll accelerate up to light speed – meaning that it’ll only be a few months for him. But even when things don’t go the way they’re supposed to, he continues to hope that she’ll wait for him. The story is told through fifteen letters to his fiancé and is a powerhouse of emotion: hope, despair, resiliency. Despite the circumstances keeping them apart, he keeps doing his best to get back to her, eagerly waiting for and anticipating the day he’ll see her again, even while it feels like he’s the only human left in the universe.

The middle set of stories were a little more opaque. Earth is a training ground created by a set of beings who divide themselves and send themselves there to learn. The stories are told from the point of view of Naban, a Teacher whose numerous experiences have led them towards asceticism. Their views, however, are in conflict with some of the other more popular Teachers, who instead prefer to spend their Earth lives accruing power and money. This story was harder to get in to and was more overtly philosophical in nature. The second of the stories in the set is a direct continuation of the first, but was more traditional in structure and much less abstract. I didn’t enjoy these as much as the other pair of stories, even though in some ways they’re exploring some of the same sort of ideas, and I’m probably going to blame that on pandemic brain.

The last story is the bookend to the collection, a matching set of fifteen letters from the fiancée’s point of view. While much of what the first narrator has to overcome is his complete isolation from other people, for the woman, hell is other people. She goes through the same set of emotions as him, though, and perseveres through it all with the hope of seeing her fiancé again. I almost liked this one better than the first, as it was intriguing seeing the same events through her eyes, and I loved HUN the AI.

There’s also a series of author’s notes and translators’ notes at the end that explain a little more in depth about the creation of these stories and how they were translated, and it was definitely especially helpful for understanding more about the middle set of stories.

Overall, I’d give the collection as a whole around 3.5 stars, and I’ll definitely be looking for more work from this author in translation!

I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

"Someone once said that space and time are actually the same thing. That would mean going to a different time is the same as going to a different place." -His Second Letter

This is a collection of short stories written by the Korean sci-fi writer Kim Bo-Young. The collection is divided into three parts:

-I'm Waiting for You
-The Prophet of Corruption
-On My Way to You

The first part, I'm Waiting for You, are 15 letters written by a man to his fiancée. The couple is separated by time and space. Each letter felt authentic because of the lingo and feelings expressed by an anxious groom.

The first and last part of the collection are connected. The last part, On my Way to You, are 15 letters written by a woman to her fiancée. I appreciated the complete separation of the letters between the fiancées. My mind had to fill in the blanks in the first part, while the last part revealed whether my assumptions were correct.

The middle part, The Prophet of Corruption, was hard to finish. I came close to skipping it all together, but I am glad I finished. I would suggest reading the author's note to gain clarification and more of appreciation for this part of the collection. The beginning stories are disorienting and there are many moving parts. It is hard to explain without giving the story away. Key Ideas: Existentialism, whole versus parts, quest for knowledge/wisdom, lower realm (Earth) versus dark realm (afterlife).

outh Korea is uncharted territory for me. I happily welcome author Kim Bo-Young to her first publication in the Western world. In South Korea, she's a renowned author, has her own wikipedia-entry there (I guess, you'll need to google-translate that). 

This collection contains two pairs of linked stories which is a good teaser to get to know her work but by far not enough to understand this author:

★★+☆☆☆ • I'm Waiting for You and On My Way are two time travel novelettes in epistolary format. The bride has to travel in light speed from Alpha Centauri to Earth which takes years relatively for the waiting groom and a few months for the bride. He is the author of the first novelette, where he declares in letters to the bride that he'll go on a waiting travel to shorten the time. There are fifteen such letters in summary, each narrating yet another problem lengthening his journey. Which doesn't matter much, because his bride is hindered similarly, first by an emergency call which the ship has to follow, then ever more disgressions and plain dumb decisions. Both novelettes can be read independently of each other, but reading both brings forth the full drama. It's a story full of unfulfilled longing and romance - which I don't care for at all - with several unbelievable occurrences. A kind of time-travel story which you might love if you cared for This Is How You Lose the Time War (which I DNFed).

★★★★☆ • The Prophet of Corruption is a metaphysical novella with short story spinoff That One Life. The creators of the universe experiment a lot to find out what is possible. Earth is a kind of laboratory for them. One of them, Aman, is "corrupted", a disease contracted by those deeply immersed in life on Earth which lets them attach more importance to their "Lower Realm" lives and believe that the original Dark Realm is illusory. They think that they are individuums, something completely separate from the others, instead of being one with everyone else. Naban wants to cure Aman from corruptness by merging with him. An epic journey through several instantiations of herself follows, clarifying the gods' ways of thinking, their nature and understanding of the world. A truly innovative look from the completely foreign perspective of gods. Highly recommended for advanced readers of surreal, metaphysical stories. 


The second pair of stories are worth the whole collection. I'd wished that the publication would have contained a broader view on the author's work.

What a delightful group of short stories! Full of existential thoughts about love, humanity and existence, the stories in "I'm Waiting for You" are all beautiful and emotionally resonant. I especially loved the stories that bookend the collection: "I'm Waiting for You" and "On My Way" for their portrayal of a couple traversing space and time to finally make it to each other to get married. It was even more wonderful to learn that "I'm Waiting for You" as a story had originally been commissioned by a man wanting to use it to propose to his girlfriend! Overall, this is a story collection that I loved more and more as I read on and one that I would definitely like to revisit again!

This was really unique! Some of the stuff went over my head and I had to reread some parts but I was so intrigued. My favorite stories were The Prophet of Corruption and That One Life. The other two stories which are connected and are letters to each other were also very interesting but I was a bit bored at times and found the women’s perspective more interesting. Looking forward to reading more from this author!