The Nature of Things

I have to admit up front that I read this book in a state of fury. It's easy to see why it caused such a stir in South Korea when it was published there in 2016. No doubt it struck a chord with many Korean women, probably every one who read it and it soon became a best-seller, selling more than a million copies. The reviewer in The New York Times compared its effect there to Uncle Tom's Cabin in this country. It sparked a feminist wave in South Korea and I can certainly understand why. The book has now been translated into 18 different languages and is an international best-seller. And now we have the English version. The book tells the story of a young woman who suffers from dissociative episodes and is driven to psychosis because of the stresses of her life. She is the middle child of her parents. She has an older sister and the only reason they had another child was because they were trying for a son. They failed. After her birth, her mother got pregnant again and learned ...