Please Look After Mom: A Novel

Kyung-Sook Shin

Apr 2011 · Sold by Vintage

About this ebook

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE MAN ASIAN LITERARY PRIZE • When sixty-nine-year-old So-nyo is separated from her husband among the crowds of the Seoul subway station, her family begins a desperate search to find her. Yet as long-held secrets and private sorrows begin to reveal themselves, they are forced to wonder: how well did they actually know the woman they called Mom?

“A terrific novel that stayed with me long after I’d finished its final, haunting pages.” —Abraham Verghese, bestselling author of The Covenant of Water

“A raw tribute to the mysteries of motherhood.” —The New York Times Book Review

Told through the piercing voices and urgent perspectives of a daughter, son, husband, and mother, Please Look After Mom is at once an authentic picture of contemporary life in Korea and a universal story of family love.

“A suspenseful, haunting, achingly lovely novel about the hidden lives, wishes, struggles and dreams of those we think we know best.” —The Seattle Times

Ratings and reviews

read this book several years ago. I will always remember this book that has a special place in my heart. at the time I was living at a state and personally just really wanting to see and be with my mother. the book itself details the ongoings of a family that has lost their mother and is in the process of searching for her each member of the family experiences this tragedy in their own way and how they deal with the new normal of grief. I have recently lost someone special to me and lately this book has been on my mind might pick it up and read it again. maybe I will find something in the book to help me with the process of my own grief.

I'm here in Korea as a duty assignment (Army) and I just fished this book. Amazing book, I really enjoyed it.

Some parts were a bit confusing but I really enjoyed the story and the different perspectives.

About the author

KYUNG-SOOK SHIN is the author of numerous works of fiction and is one of South Korea’s most widely read and acclaimed novelists. She was the first woman to be awarded the Man Asian Literary Prize (for Please Look After Mom), and she has also been honored with the Manhae Literature Prize, the Dong-in Literature Prize, and the Yi Sang Literary Prize, as well as France’s Prix de l’Inaperçu. Please Look After Mom is her first book to appear in English. It will be published in twenty-nine countries and has sold over 2 million copies in South Korea alone.