Concerning My Daughter

In Concerning My Daughter, Kim Hye-jin explores the universal fears of aging, death, and isolation, offering a paean to love in all its forms. The novel is a nuanced portrait of prejudice and humanizes someone whose prejudice has made her cruel.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 176 pages
Publication date: 27 April 2023
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

When a mother allows her thirty-something daughter to move into her apartment, she desires for her what many mothers might say they want for their child: a steady income, and, even better, a good husband with a good job with whom to start a family. But when Green arrives with her girlfriend Lane in tow, her mother is unprepared and unwilling to welcome Lane into her home. In fact, she can barely bring herself to be civil. Having centered her life on her husband and child, her daughter's definition of family is not one she can accept. Her daughter's involvement in a case of unfair dismissal involving gay colleagues from the university where she works is similarly strange to her. And yet, when the care home where she works insists that she lower her standard of care for an elderly dementia patient who has no family, who traveled the world as a successful diplomat, who chose not to have children, Green's mother cannot accept it. Why should not having chosen a traditional life mean that your life is worth nothing at all?

In Concerning My Daughter, translated from Korean by Jamie Chang, Kim Hye-jin lays bare our most universal fears on ageing, death, and isolation to offer, finally, a paean to love in all its forms. An admirably nuanced portrait of prejudice. . . one that boldly takes on the daunting task of humanizing someone whose prejudice has made her cruel. - The New York Times

Weight: 132g
Dimension: 197 x 130 x 13 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781529057683