“Invitation is an exquisite debut—subtle, elliptical stories, shadowed with menace. Mi Jin Kim’s themes are enduring—loneliness and longing, absence and loss—but she revivifies them with a preternatural acuity of detail (the tenuousness of Korean middle-class life is keenly felt) and a mordant reverence for the mysteries of the human condition.”—Peter Ho Davies, author of The Fortunes

“Invitation is a story collection that accumulates in power as it accrues in tensions and characters and resonant details. This is the work of an important new fiction writer.”—Laura Kasischke, author of Lightning Falls in Love

“Character is at the center of Mi Jin Kim’s arresting and harrowing stories: character in all its complexities, contradictions, deceptions, longings, and desires. In a contemporary short fiction landscape that sometimes favors the speculative and the surreal, Kim’s stories are a powerful reminder that the human heart remains the strangest territory of them all—and the wildest ride around. A brilliant, memorable collection.”—Anthony Varallo, author of What Did You Do Today?

“Invitation is a stunning debut collection made up of stories that are at once irreverent, riveting, mysterious, and heartbreaking. At their surface level, these stories sparkle with cool, vivid detail. But beneath the surface, the characters that make up Invitation are a fragile crew. Their dogs bolt in the night; their love letters are read only after they have been discarded. These lonely men and women endure monsoons and misunderstandings as they follow their dreams in and around Seoul, into drab fast food restaurants and agonizingly tidy apartments. A postmodern Chekhov, Mi Jin Kim is a dazzling talent, and her first book will leave an indelible mark on contemporary fiction.”—Douglas Trevor, author of Girls I Know and The Book of Wonders