This novel is just remarkable. There are scenes in the book that you will never forget. Han Kang the recent recpient of the Nobel Prize has her 2021 novel published in English. I read the book in one seating (i was on a six hour flight) and could not put it down. It's a tough read since it's about a massacre that took place on Jeju Island. The two main charcters are Kyungha and Inseon. They are good friends and when Kyungha gets in an accident at her woodshed she asks Inseon to go feed her bird Ama who hasn't been fed in three days. When she goes out there the novel explores the massacre that took place in 1948. The bird resuce intertwines with the descriptions of what it was like for the citizens fleeing the island and the fate of many will haunt you. I can't remember a book that literally made you look at humanity and the horrible things that we can do to each other with a flick of a switch. It reminds me of things happening today and how we as humans never seem to learn from past mistakes and horrors and how we can never feel safe because people can do these things. The novel is told in a kalidescopic way so be patient with it because by the final page you will be moved and feel ashamed that you may have not know that this massacre happened and that we must pay pay close attention that it can never happen again but sadly things like this will continue to curse humanity. Thank you #netgalley and Hogarth Rando House for this incredble novel. (I'd give it six if I could!)

Unique, atmospheric, absorbing story of friendship and history. The writing is lovely, descriptive, and memorable. The history of Korea in the 40s and early 50s was one of incredible tragedy, and connected to the two friends at the center of the story. This book had a wonderful sense of place.

An ethereal and atmospheric fever dream that reminds us not to forget our past by connecting a modern female friendship with two massacres on South Korea. Kang is a phenomenal writer, her prose is immaculate - I could feel the Jeju snowstorm with all my senses. My only issue was sometimes the past and present links didn't full land, but I realized I didn't really care, I was enjoying the writing so much.

4.5 stars

This is a beautifully written book- I highlighted many passages that resonated with me and knew I would want to come back to. One line in particular, "I had not reconciled with life, but I had to resume living", is one that stuck with me, as the main character is on the cusp of mostly self-imposed life and death. The first chapter reminded me a bit of 'A Man Called Ove', in the blase way the characters go on living, when perhaps they would rather die- the lengths each character goes to get their affairs in order to make their parting easier on others. As this book proceeds though; it becomes about so much more- travelling into the underbelly of the massacre in Jeju, South Korea. The realism, underlying meaning in metaphors, and poetic narrative makes this a beautiful and haunting novel. It is definitely a dense and emotionally heavy read, but well worth it to experience the artful poetry of Kang. Thank you to #NetGalley and #RandomHousePublishingGroup for the ARC

this one is brilliant — in the way a matchstick lights up a room ensconced in darkness. this book sent chills down my spine and didn’t stop until I got to the last page. and I was in 80 degree weather. I got past midpoint and I threw the book down and was OH MY GOODNESS HOW DID I TRANSCEND INTO HORROR. I mean it’s not a horror novel (and it is a ghost story) but Kang has this way of escalating the inhumanity of the atrocities we commit during wartime and the aftermath of said atrocities. For this book, she focused on the killings following the Jeju Uprising…eff it was intense. I really enjoyed the friendship between Kyungha ans Inseon. Artists who can vibe with each other’s work and get inspired and excited by each other’s vision - that’s beautiful.

Thanks to Hogarth Books for an advanced read.

Helping a friend sets a troubled woman on a journey.

Novelist Kyungha is deeply disturbed by dreams after publishing a book, the research for which had her probing a difficult time in Korea's past. She has gone into near complete seclusion but is called back into the world when her friend Inseon contacts her and asks for her help, Inseon has been badly injured and is confined to a hospital, but has left behind a pet bird Ama who will perish if someone doesn't immediately see to its care. Inseon has been living in Jeju in a family home, an area of the country known for a horrific purge of rebels decades earlier. Kynugha sets out on the trek to Jeju, struggles through terrible weather, and once arrived finds herself drawn into the past, particularly that of Inseon's grandmother Min who was a child in Jeju when the anti-communist purge swept through.
Author Han Kang, winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, is reknowned for her poetic use of language and the imagery which permeates her works. In We Do Not Part the reader traces a friendship between two women as well as learns about a part of Korean history that has not been widely told but which merits exploration, the Jeju Uprising of 1948-1949. Snow, birds, fingers, dreams and trauma are blended into the tale through Min's memories and the dream-like state of Kyungha's research. What truths must be told, and will closure result in positive change? The horrors that were wrought on the people of Jeju were and remain horrific, but are approached with respect and a desire to understand as the author confronts the pain inherent to the events. This is not a pleasant topic, but those who read it are rewarded with an elegantly crafted narrative and beautiful language. Readers of Han Kang's previous works will certainly appreciate this latest offering, as would those who enjoy authors like Kazuo Ishiguro, Ian McEwan and Da Chen. Many thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group/Hogarth for allowing me access to this intense but beautiful novel in exchange for my honest review.

Han Kang’s “We Do Not Part” exemplifies “her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life" for which she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in October. The novel’s protagonist and narrator, Kyungha, a writer who is tormented by nightmares after publishing a book about mass killings and torture (presumably about the 1980 massacre in Gwangju, Korea), has secluded herself for months in her apartment in Seoul, suffering from migraines and nausea, barely eating, and writing and rewriting her “Last Will.” Despite her anxiety and depression, Kyungha does not hesitate when she receives a text from her friend of decades, Inseon, who asks her to come immediately to a hospital in Seoul. Inseon, a documentary film-maker who is a carpenter, sliced off two fingers with an electric saw and was undergoing agonizing treatment. She tasks Kyungha with traveling to her home on Jeju Island, where Inseon had moved to care for her mother until her recent passing, to save her pet bird, Ama, who is caged without food or water.

Kang describes, without histrionics or theatrics, Kyungha’s harrowing journey as she plods her way through the heavy snow and gale force winds trying to reach Inseon’s remote cabin. Kang’s spare prose shines, but particularly in her descriptions of snow: “As the snow lands on the wet asphalt, each flake seems to falter for a moment. Then, like a trailing sentence at the close of a conversation, like the dying fall of a final cadence, like fingertips cautiously retreating before ever landing on a shoulder, the flakes sink into the slick blackness and are soon gone.” In a fever dream, Kyungha encounters the specter of Inseon, and learns how Inseon’s family was impacted by the 1948–1949 Jeju Massacre, in which U.S.-backed Korean forces killed over 30,000 Jeju Island residents suspected of aiding insurgents.

Kang’s restraint in confronting historical trauma makes this novel particularly disquieting. Kang celebrates the resilience of life and hope despite generational trauma and tragedy. A powerful novel of friendship and the violent legacies of the past. Thank you Jaylen Lopez, Assistant Director of Marketing, Random House & Hogarth Books for an advanced copy of this important must read.

I just finished reading this, and it’s perfect. The language is beautiful, the story is haunting and profound, and I couldn’t put it down. Now more than ever, Kang’s reckoning with the way people in power commit atrocities - and then censor, repress, and attempt to rewrite the truth about those atrocities - is so important. Remembering is important. Empathy and courage are important. This book is amazing.

Thanks so much to Hogarth for the review copy.

Everything about this feels painful but also somehow beautiful. Snow and cold weather do not get enough credit for being deadly and gorgeous. Friendship, grief, generational trauma, trauma denial...all of these things are a maelstrom in this quiet, gut-punching novel. At times I wasn't even sure what I was reading because I felt like I was drifting away on the imagery. This hurts.

Han Kang never fails to amaze me with the prose. Her writing is so poetic and symbolic, and the way she writes about nature in We Do Not Part is amazing and breathtaking. The novel follows Kyungha as she journeys through a snowstorm to retrieve a bird at the request of her friend, Inseon, who suffered an accident.

The element of snow in We Do Not Part is so immersive throughout the book, but it also perfectly portrays the cold and the violence of Korean history mentioned in the story. I often imagined the visual of blood red against a stark snowy background and it’s such a striking contrast; Kang does a good job with creating that atmosphere. There is a solemn tone; in its essence, We Do Not Part is gruesome and sad, but it’s also such an important read. However, I’m not familiar with Korean history, so I’d say it would help to learn about it before reading this.

I try not to compare books from the same author, but I have to say this feels and reads quite different from The Vegetarian which has been the only Han Kang book I’ve read so far. We Do Not Part didn’t flow as coherently, the language was more ambiguous, and there was a somewhat confusing back and forth between reality and imagination. That said, it doesn’t take away the fact that the book touches on friendships, war and history, family, and generational trauma so hauntingly and stunningly.

In the end, I realize how powerful the title is and those four words strung together will stay in my mind for a while.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

2.5 || I feel quite strange giving a mediocre rating to the latest Nobel laureate's 2025 release. I mean, Han Kang just won the Nobel prize in literature, which is no small feat, and she is the first South Korean to win it, as well.

I guess I should preface by saying this is my second of Kang's books that I have read. I got to read an ARC of her 2023 release (it was originally published in Korean in 2011, but was published for the first time in English in 2023), Greek Lessons, and I rated that book a hesitant 4 stars.
Basically, after reading We Do Not Part, I find I have the same issues I had with Greek Lessons, but they felt more pertinent in this novel. This could also be a case where upon reading a second work by Kang, I feel quite confident in saying that her storytelling style is one based on vagueness. I did find Greek Lesson to be confusing and hard to follow, and We Do Not Part was even more convoluted. So, perhaps this is something that I was willing to overlook the first time I read Kang's work, but not something I can keep glossing over, if not for the simple notion of wanting to actually understand what the author desires to communicate through each of her books.

The synopsis told me that this was a novel about a woman that must travel to Jeju Island in order to retrieve her friend's pet bird, and that is the main premise, but I am afraid that all the other things Kang wanted to convey—and perhaps educate me on—were somehwhat lost on me.

Was this novel's focus supposed to be on our MC/narrator, Kyungha, and her current unstable state of mind? Was I supposed to want to know more about her backstory and what sparked her descent into slight madness? I did want to know more—I wanted to know why she suddenly found herself alone and scared, after stating in the first chapter that she had a daughter and a family. I wanted to know if somehow losing her family was truly what led Kyungha to no longer be able to tell the difference between dream or reality. Or maybe it's what Kyungha herself suspects—she initially hypothesizes that her current mental state's direct cause was her research and publication of her book on the Gwangju Uprising. But even Kyungha starts to question her theory, and this is barely touched on after the very first chapter.
So many questions left unanswered. I don't always need everything to be spelled out for me, and vagueness can be something I actually tend to enjoy in literature, but, alas, the ratio between questions and actual context that could give me some answers in this particular novel is way too wide for me.

Was this story really about Kyungha's friend, Inseon? Was this just a way for Kang to tell us—through Inseon—about the Jeju uprising that occurred on 04/03/1948? It could be, because we start to learn in bits until the latter half where there is a lot of storytelling done by Inseon in which she is recounting her island's history from her parent's perspectives, as well as her own and others who she has spoken with. The thing is, I would not be able to confidently categorize this book as historical fiction. Yes, we come to discover certain details about Jeju 4.3 (this is what it is known as in South Korea), and there was use of allusion to another massacre that occurred in South Korea later in 1980: the Gwangju Uprising. BUT! I would not have known or understood most of the history stuff if it weren't for my own research. I feel like maybe towards the end certain aspects of Jeju 4.3 were spelled out a bit more clearly, but for most of the book, I was grasping at straws. Google helped me out and gave me the context I felt that I needed. Which brings me to a theory I have: I think that you will either 1) already be aware of this particular aspect in Korean history, or 2) you will be forced to do your own research, because there are even city names that aren't spelled out and Kang only gave us the first letter, or 3) you are the chillest of the chill readers and don't need or care to know everything.

Lastly, I wanna touch on what I think this story is really about: Kyungha and Inseon's friendship. And this is definitely what I enjoyed most about this novel; their history and scenes together are what drove me to keep going. I should also mention quickly before continuing that, of course, the writing is beautiful. This is something I enjoyed about Greek Lessons, and Kang's delectable prose was ever present in We Do Not Part. This along with what Inseon meant to Kyungha and vice versa, were the two elements that kept me from rating this any lower than 2.5 stars.
Even though we don't get much from Kyungha's past, we learn a lot about Inseon, making her shine a bit more brightly, and it's an endearing notion because Inseon shines through Kyungha's eyes.
In a time where both women aren't surrounded by friends and family they can turn to, they realize that their friendship was and is extremely valuable.

I'm gonna leave it at that. If you have enjoyed Kang's previous work, then you are probably going to enjoy this one! (:

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House | Hogarth for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

The bonds of shared friendship and horror meld together in this horrific and dreamlike novel mingled with images of stark white snow stained with red drops of blood. Kyungha’s friend Inseon has had an accident and was transported from her home on Jeju Island to a hospital in Seoul. But Inseon’s pet bird Ama needs to be taken care of so Kyungha travels by plane and bus to get to Inseon’s home on the island during a major snowstorm. Her real and dreamlike journey takes us down the road of friendship and remembrance as the book unspools the horror of thousands of lives cruelly extinguished and families destroyed during Korea’s history that had been long buried. This is a stark and visual read with the experience and condition of the landscape and environment during the snow storm harkening to the realities of what occurred in the late 1940s and early 1950s. I sometimes found moving back and forth between the real and dreamlike parts challenging, which probably was intentional. This is a book that definitely highlights a not-to-be-forgotten part of Korean history presented in a unique way by the author. Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Snow. Engrossed. Wonder. South Korea. Powerful. Soul-shattering. Take care when wandering into the detritus of what you are writing. Every human piece of me sunk into these meltingly written words on the pages. My imagination using lived experience to bring forth visions of new perspectives and places never before visualized or conceptualized. Ardent feelings bubbling up all along the way. Phew. This was powerful and it would behoove you to add this to your books read in a lifetime. Not to mention pertinent to this time and space in America right now. Oof, I’m left with a lot of grief and empathy and reminders that we have to keep fighting for empathy and for all humanity.

Kang turns the natural into something skeptical. Something as pure and welcomed as snow, can turn into a glue that melts deeper and deeper into our skin, like the memories of the past Kang’s narrator describes. We Do Not Part is quite literally a force of nature: hypnotic, mesmerizing, and aptly chilling

Nobel Prize winner Han Kang’s We Do Not Part opens with a writer’s repeated nightmares in Seoul four years after publishing her book on the massacre at G----, presumably the Gwangju Massacre at the heart of the Han Kang’s earlier Human Acts. Struggling with these nightmares, researcher-writer Kyungha also struggles futilely to write her will, starting over day after day.

Unexpectedly, she receives a brief message from the photographer with whom she had previously worked, entreating her to come at once. A former documentary filmmaker and now a woodworker, Inseon has been seriously injured and transferred from the island of Jeju to a hospital in Seoul. Requiring several weeks of constant treatment, Inseon begs Kyungha to travel immediately to Jeju to save the life of Inseon’s white budgie (parakeet) Ama, who won’t survive another day without food and water.

Facing a blizzard on Jeju and needing to travel by buses as well as hike through the dark to Inseon’s remote home, Kyungha faces mortal danger. While traveling, she recalls her work and friendship with Inseon, a former trip to Inseon’s home, and stories passed on to her from Inseon’s now deceased mother.

Thin on traditional plot, We Do Not Part is comprised primarily of nightmares, memories, and passed-down experiences of massacres that military regimes and local police have inflicted upon their fellow citizens.

Neither a happy nor enjoyable book, We Do Not Part is an important, unforgettable one sure to open most non-Korean readers’ eyes to political atrocities, none of which I had heard of despite some occurring during my lifetime. At times, readers may wonder whether characters, both human and avian, are flesh and blood or spirits, but such questions seem in keeping with the dreamed and historic nightmares permeating this story of inseparable, although perhaps fatal, friendship.

Thanks to NetGalley and Hogarth/Random House for an advance reader egalley of this attention-grabbing new work from Han Kang.

This mostly worked for me, and it really seems like Kang at the peak of her prowess. It’s a harsh yet surreal exploration of the brutality of Korean history, suspended between dream and reality, life and death. I wanted a little bit more meat to the relationship between Kyungha and Inseon, but it’s an unflinching and intimate exploration of state violence. The most obvious comparison is to Human Acts - the true historical basis; the frank depictions of violence - but there’s something of The Vegetarian in here with the surreality and even The White Book with the hazy, loose form. A novel that I think is more rewarding when read as part of an ouevre.

This is my first novel by Han Kang, the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature.

Kyungha, a writer suffering from migraines and abdominal spasms, receives a message from Inseon, a friend who left her career as photographer/film documentarian to become a woodworker. Inseon has been hospitalized because of an injury and asks Kyungha to travel to her house on Jeju Island to save her pet bird. A snowstorm impedes Kyungha’s travel, but her eventual arrival at her friend’s home brings her face to face with a dark, forgotten chapter in Korean history.

For me this was a challenging read both because of its style and its subject matter. The experimental style, often bordering on stream-of-consciousness, with its ambiguity I sometimes found confusing. The narrative switches frequently and suddenly between past and present and between perspectives so I struggled with orienting myself. Then there are sequences, especially in the second half of the novel, which blur the boundaries between dream and reality so it is difficult to determine what is real and what is imagined. Of course, this blurring is appropriate given that the content emphasizes the difficulties of penetrating a history kept hidden.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t comment on the beautiful, poetic prose with its vivid metaphors. The descriptions of snow are gorgeous: “white thread-like flakes draw empty paths through the air” and “snowflakes swirl wildly as if inside a giant popcorn machine” and “Snowflakes resembling a flock of tens of thousands of birds appear like a mirage” and “Each snowflake made its endlessly slow descent, seeming to thread together in mid-air like giant motifs in a lace curtain” and “a flurry of snow coruscating like fine grains of salt” and “the flakes were floating down like feathers now, and I could see their crystalline shapes” and “As the snow lands on the wet asphalt, each flake seems to falter for a moment. Then, like a trailing sentence at the close of a conversation, like the dying fall of a final cadence, like fingertips cautiously retreating before ever landing on a shoulder, the flakes sink into the slick blackness and are soon gone.”

Of course, the snow, like so much other imagery, is symbolic. Kyungha finds herself almost buried in snow, just as the past has been buried. Her struggle parallels the difficulty of re-visiting the past. The ferocity of the snowstorm mirrors the brutality of the events that occurred on Jeju Island. What cannot but strike the reader is the contrast between the beautiful language and the horrific content.

My lack of knowledge about Korean history was definitely a factor in my understanding of events being described. I might recommend that readers familiarize themselves with the events in South Korea between 1948 and 1954, but that would undoubtedly lessen the emotional impact of what is revealed. Nonetheless the reader must be prepared to read about torture, ethnic cleansing, and genocide so that, like Inseon, the reader might find that “nothing one human being did to another could ever shock. . . again.” I imagine that most readers will be motivated to do some research after finishing the novel.

The message of the book, as its title clearly suggests, is that we cannot and should not be separated from our pasts and each other. Trauma lingers long after the violence ends, even for generations, but healing can be found in remembrance and human connection.

This poignant and powerful novel demands much of readers. Not only is it challenging in terms of style, but it also asks readers to bear witness to traumatic events and to remember. It’s a book worth not just reading but re-reading because it’s so masterfully written that it is impossible for a reader to grasp all its artistry and nuances in one read.

Kyungha is a writer who has become haunted with nightmares after writing about a little known terrible Korean massacre. She has a friend, Inseon, woodworker and film maker, who she confided about her nightmare and idea to collaborate to bring her nightmare’s scene to film. Kyungha gets a call from Inseon, there’s been an accident and she’s in the hospital. When they meet at the hospital, Inseon pleads with Kyungha to go check on her pet bird. A serious snowstorm hits during her travel, and she barely makes it to Inseon’s home on Jeju Island. Once there, reality is a blur. Truth about Inseon’s hidden family tragedy (the Jeju uprising and subsequent massacre (truly genocide) of believed communists by South Korea’s army supported by the U.S. government) comes to light revealing a horrific hidden massacre decades earlier. This book is incredible. Descriptions of Inseon’s documentaries throughout make it feel kind of like mixed media. At every step, I wasn’t sure what was actually happening in real time. Memory, art, history, grief, and haunting nightmares meld together. The prose about generational trauma hit so hard and heartbreakingly so. A very dark but important read.

I read and loved Han Kang's The Vegetarian yesterday, but I couldn't get into the writing in this novel.

Dreamlike, unusual, powerful.

I loved, loved, loved the first half of this novel, which was so, so spooky and eerie and, like, somehow simultaneously deeply embodied and totally dreamlike. I loved the incredible scenes of Kyungha in the snow, Inseon in the hospital, Kyungha alternately having her dream and lying on the ground under the air conditioner and eating bean juk and wanting to die. It was totally immersive and I loved it.

And then... I didn't love the second half of the novel so much, just because it wasn't doing exactly the same things that I loved in the first half. But I can also tell that the second half of the novel is the entire reason the first half of the novel was written.

I would recommend this book; it's evocative and powerful and excellently written and I love Han Kang. But it's not really the kind of book that you can evaluate or judge the way you can ordinarily judge a commercial work of fiction. It's just doing something so personal and weird (which I do love).