Honey in the Wound

A lyrical and suspenseful debut novel about a mysteriously gifted Korean family confronting the brutality of the Japanese empire.

A sister disappears and returns as a tiger. A mother's voice compels the truth from any tongue. A granddaughter divines secrets in others' dreams.

Spanning ninety years as one family is displaced across Asia, this novel follows Young-Ja, who finds herself struggling to survive after her family is killed by Japanese soldiers. The magical gift that once brought her joy—the ability to infuse her cooking with her feelings: love, peace, delight—transforms into something more powerful as her sorrow and anger seep into her confections.

When her talent is noticed by a Korean resistance fighter, she's taken to Manchuria where she becomes enmeshed in a network of spies at a teahouse favoured by Japanese officials. Haunted at every turn by the spectre of Japanese soldiers, she endures horrors and brutality at the hands of the Imperial Army.

With spellbinding inter-generational sweep and atmospheric magical realism, Honey in the Wound explores the ways colonialism forces one family to transform, and ultimately survive.