Being queer, this book makes me wonder how my parents really view my queerness considering how they still talk to members of my family about my girlfriend being my friend; are they trying to protect me, or are they worried about how it will reflect on them? It was a very painful read in this way, but I did enjoy seeing the mother's way of caring for the elderly patients and was heartened (in a way?) by her

ultimately losing her job because she refused to take part in elder abuse

. This also hit me pretty hard, as it reminded me think about how the people at my grandma's nursing home could have possibly treated her the way they did.

On another note, I don't really know how I feel about the ending...it seemed like it was at the right point to stop but, at the same time, felt very abrupt and indefinite.

The book, itself, I think is a great example for how to take on the perspective of a multifaceted character, but the story itself was rather bleak and just alright, I guess.

A moving story about motherhood and love. About the bonds that unite us as much as the things that keep us about from one another. 

Sometimes all you can do is keep going, even if there are issues that you can't work out just yet. 

This is an interesting little book. Concerning My Daughter is a Korean novel which is narrated by an older woman who is struggling with her daughter - known as Green through the book, despite the mother resenting this nickname - living a life she doesn't recognise, as a gay politically active young woman. Green and her girlfriend Lane end up living with the mother, who also spends her days caring for the elderly as an agency care worker, meaning she is forced to grapple with both a relationship she doesn't recognise and her belief that by staying quiet and sticking to the status quo is the best way to live a happy life.

It's hard to spend time in the head of someone so deeply homophobic but who still claims to love her daughter and want the best for her, but it was a perspective that was interesting to be forced to grapple with by the author. As was the insight into the gruelling, cost saving adult care world that the narrator works within, forcing her to grapple with her impending mortality and the risk of becoming invisible and unknown as you age.

It did feel that this book didn't quite have the depth it needed to really fly in exploring the issues that it wants to - ideas are introduced and then disappear and we never really get to know any of the side characters. 

A perfect book for socialist baby lesbians in crisis. No I will not elaborate!

This one hits a lil too close to home for me because I too currently work in healthcare with a woman who has memory loss and I too am gay and have a girlfriend and I too do not like my roommate and I also do not have children. I am all of these characters. So extra points for being relevant to me and the life I currently live but who knows how I'll feel about it next year. I like the way the emotions are expressed. Even though it's a translation of a language I don't know I feel they did the original justice.