Sonya Chung’s astonishing first novel tells the story of a family divided between contemporary America and a small Korean town. Long for This World is about loss and renewal, and what it means to go home.
In 1953, on a small island in South Korea, a young boy stows away on the ferry that is carrying his older brother and sister-in-law to the mainland. Fifty-two years later, Han Hyun-kyu is on a plane back to Korea, leaving behind his wife and grown children in America. It is his daughter Jane—a war photographer recently injured in a bombing in Baghdad and forced to return to New York—who journeys to find him in the small southern Korean town where his brothers have settled. Here, father and daughter take refuge from their demons, unearth passions, and, in the wake of tragedy, each discover something deeper and more enduring than they’d imagined possible.
Long for this World is a pointillist triumph--depicting whole worlds through the details of a carefully prepared meal or a dark childhood memory. But, Chung is also working on a massive scale, effortlessly moving between domestic intimacies and the global stage—Iraq, Paris, Darfur, Syria—to illuminate the relationship between troubled world affairs and personal devastation. The result is a profound portrayal of the human experience—both large and small. Long for This World establishes Sonya Chung as a thrilling new voice in fiction.
About t
he author:
Sonya Chung lives in New York City and rural Pennsylvania. She is a graduate of Columbia University and the University of Washington. Her short fiction, essays, and reviews have appeared in The Threepenny Review, BOMB Magazine, Cream City Review, Crab Orchard Review, and Sonora Review, among others. She is a recipient of the Charles Johnson Fiction Award, a Pushcart Prize nomination, and the Bronx Council on the Arts Literary Fellowship & Residency. Long for This World is her first novel.
Advance praise for Long for This World:
"An intricately structured and powerfully resonant portrait of lives lived at the crossroads of culture, and a family torn between the old world and the new, Long For This World marks a powerful debut from a young writer of great talent and promise."
—Kate Walbert, author of A Short History of Women and The Gardens of Kyoto
The title of Chung’s exquisite novel seems to be missing a word: “not long for this world” would be the easy, expected phrase. But little is easy or expected in this multilayered story… Readers who enjoyed superbly crafted, globe-trotting family sagas such as Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows, Naeem Murr’s The Perfect Man, or Chang-rae Lee’s A Gesture Life will swoon over Chung’s breathtaking debut.”
-Library Journal (starred review)
“…elegant debut novel.. Switching deftly between different characters’ points of view, Chung portrays with precision and grace each character’s struggle to find his or her place in the family and in the world.”
–Publisher’s Weekly
Links: Website, Book Tour Schedule, Amazon, B&N
In 1953, on a small island in South Korea, a young boy stows away on the ferry that is carrying his older brother and sister-in-law to the mainland. Fifty-two years later, Han Hyun-kyu is on a plane back to Korea, leaving behind his wife and grown children in America. It is his daughter Jane—a war photographer recently injured in a bombing in Baghdad and forced to return to New York—who journeys to find him in the small southern Korean town where his brothers have settled. Here, father and daughter take refuge from their demons, unearth passions, and, in the wake of tragedy, each discover something deeper and more enduring than they’d imagined possible.
Long for this World is a pointillist triumph--depicting whole worlds through the details of a carefully prepared meal or a dark childhood memory. But, Chung is also working on a massive scale, effortlessly moving between domestic intimacies and the global stage—Iraq, Paris, Darfur, Syria—to illuminate the relationship between troubled world affairs and personal devastation. The result is a profound portrayal of the human experience—both large and small. Long for This World establishes Sonya Chung as a thrilling new voice in fiction.
About t
he author: Sonya Chung lives in New York City and rural Pennsylvania. She is a graduate of Columbia University and the University of Washington. Her short fiction, essays, and reviews have appeared in The Threepenny Review, BOMB Magazine, Cream City Review, Crab Orchard Review, and Sonora Review, among others. She is a recipient of the Charles Johnson Fiction Award, a Pushcart Prize nomination, and the Bronx Council on the Arts Literary Fellowship & Residency. Long for This World is her first novel.
Advance praise for Long for This World:
"An intricately structured and powerfully resonant portrait of lives lived at the crossroads of culture, and a family torn between the old world and the new, Long For This World marks a powerful debut from a young writer of great talent and promise."
—Kate Walbert, author of A Short History of Women and The Gardens of Kyoto
The title of Chung’s exquisite novel seems to be missing a word: “not long for this world” would be the easy, expected phrase. But little is easy or expected in this multilayered story… Readers who enjoyed superbly crafted, globe-trotting family sagas such as Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows, Naeem Murr’s The Perfect Man, or Chang-rae Lee’s A Gesture Life will swoon over Chung’s breathtaking debut.”
-Library Journal (starred review)
“…elegant debut novel.. Switching deftly between different characters’ points of view, Chung portrays with precision and grace each character’s struggle to find his or her place in the family and in the world.”
–Publisher’s Weekly
Links: Website, Book Tour Schedule, Amazon, B&N
