The only reason this isn’t getting 5 stars is bc there was one story I wasn’t a fan of and all the others were so amazing.

Shokos smile - I really enjoyed this … it sort of reminded me of Norwegian wood in topic.  It was really sad and an interesting take on the relationships between grandparents and their granddaughters.

Xin Chào, Xin Chào - this was such a beautiful depiction of friendship and found family.  It made me so sad, but I feel like it explored cultural politics and differences within similar regions and found community really well.

Sister, my little Soonae - this was such a heartbreaking tale of sisterhood and the repercussions of the divide between North Korea and South Korea.  Devastating but important 

Hanji and Younju - this was such an interesting story on romantic relationships and isolation.  Hit deep tbh

A song from afar - this made me nearly cry, I have a lump in my throat thinking about it.  It was so upsetting and unfortunately relatable in certain ways.  Eunyoung writes about the human experience so well 

Michaela - dece but probably the weakest story (imo) from the whole collection.  I didn’t rlly connect with it very much

The secret - oh god.  This one hurt me.  Hurt me so much.  Fucking hell.  Just so upsetting