This debut novel is set against the backdrop of the Korean war. Two teenagers, Haemi Lee and Kyunghwan have had a childhood friendship that blossoms into something romantic. They live in dilapidated refugee camps, Haemi with her mother and beloved brother, who suffers from a chronic illness. Haemi eventually decides, with encouragement from her mother, to marry Jisoo, who offers more financial security than Kyunghwan. This is a decision she regrets when she eventually reunites with Kyunghwan. Haemi has four daughters, one of whom may be fathered by Kyunghwan.

If You Leave Me covers sixteen years in the tumultuous, war-torn history of Korea seen from five perspectives. The characters are all strongly drawn, as is the constant upheaval of their country.

Thank you to Goodreads and to the publisher for this book. ( )

A rollercoaster of emotion, this story gave a glimpse of what it was like for Koreans to live during the Korean War. It did provide a lot of historical background but was rather hard to read chapter by chapter from alternating characters' viewpoints. The theme was consistently romantic and suspenseful. I was left very sad at the end of the story. I don't want to give away spoilers, but lack of communication is a HUGE problem throughout the book. I am not sure if this is cultural, but I do think that the ending of this story could have been different in so many ways. Every character was flawed, yet had good qualities. However, of all the characters, I could not feel for Jisoo, except briefly when he was healing from his wounds. To me, the book does not really begin until the last 30 or 40 pages. Then to me it is hard to put the book down until it is finished. ( )

When Communist-aided forces in northern Korea invade the south, sixteen-year-old Haemi, her mother, and young brother, Hyunki, who’s tubercular, flee for their lives on foot. A year later, in 1951, the refugee family lives a precarious existence in Busan, a seaport nestled in the tip of the Korean Peninsula. Haemi goes to school and is bright enough to stay with it, if she wants.

But education is makeshift, and in a country invaded and a war that seems destined to remain a fruitless stalemate, even educated women have little scope. Besides, who can imagine a rosy, far-off future when tomorrow, and the next day, hunger will wrack your body and spirit the same way it does today?

As a form of escape, Haemi sneaks out at night to drink moonshine with Kyunghwan, a handsome, slightly older boy she’s known all her life. These risky outings, which she has to balance with her responsibilities for Hyunki’s care — the boy’s cough is alarming — provide another danger. Physically attracted to Kyunghwan, Haemi believes he shares her feelings and wants him to declare himself.

But he won’t, and when her mother pushes her to accept a marriage proposal from Jisoo, Kyunghwan’s cousin, because he has more money and better prospects, the girl agrees. The boys go off to war, and Haemi waits for her life to begin, though as a nurse’s assistant at a military hospital, she glimpses a path that she wishes she could follow.

An old story, a love triangle, and for at least the first half of If You Leave Me, Kim makes her narrative seem like a fresh take. It’s not just Haemi’s existence that’s precarious — it’s Korea’s — and the presence of the American “liberators” cuts in several directions. I like this part of the novel the best, in which Korean aspirations for freedom and prosperity, represented by the characters’ dreams, run up against poverty, desperation, and brutal circumstance. How these people carve out niches for themselves, or try to, makes compelling reading. Throughout, those who have money can skate through; those who don’t may well be beating their heads against a concrete wall.

Kim’s prose, sparse, carefully observed, and devoted to moment-to-moment gesture and feeling, fits the story like a glove.

Unfortunately, the novel loses momentum a few years after the war, when Haemi and Jisoo have children, while Kyunghwan has searched about for a successful career. Part of my impatience comes from how I see the characters, whose appeal wears thin after a while. Haemi, frustrated by her role as wife and mother, wants more and dreams of Kyunghwan, even though she knows it’s not a man she needs but a larger life. Her bitterness and mercurial moods upset everyone, and you want her to act. But this is midcentury Korea, so she’s trapped.

Jisoo, marked by his wartime experiences, can’t listen to her (or anyone else) and expects obedience. That’s an important cultural and political comment, and perhaps why Kim wrote her novel, but a theme isn’t a story, and I want to see other sides to him, to have this conflict go somewhere. As for Kyunghwan, he can’t befriend anyone for real, pleasant as he can be sometimes, so he too remains at a distance. Will he or won’t he visit his old friends? And if he does, what will happen? The answers are fairly predictable, yet still constrained by societal rules.

Finally, as the characters settle into their prescribed roles, the narrative presents a lot of back-and-forth, especially marital quarrels, that feels repetitive, both in action and theme. The almost constant argumentation seldom gets beyond “You’re selfish;” “No, you’re selfish.” That’s too bad, because the historical background, unfamiliar to me and probably to most Americans, furnishes an excellent atmosphere for what Kim wishes to say, and if she pushed the envelope a little, maybe the characters would have taken a leap.

If You Leave Me is her first novel. I hope the author’s future efforts develop her readily apparent gifts. ( )

DNF p. 240. I just lost interest in this. There didn't seem to be much of a plot and the characters came off as annoying to me. I'm glad others like this book but this book wasn't for me. ( )

Ooooh, this was a good one. Haemi's choices, and the eventual outcome of those choices, was riveting. I thought the narrative POV's were all very well done, and added much needed perspectives to the story. One of my favorites of the year!