Search This Blog

2024 Bookish Books Reading Challenge (Hosted by Yours Truly)

2024 Challenge Sign-Up Post

January Reviews Link-Up

February Reviews Link-Up

March Reviews Link-Up

April Reviews Link-Up

May Reviews Link-Up

June Reviews Link-Up

July Reviews Link-Up

August Reviews Link-Up

September Reviews Link-Up

October Reviews Link-Up

November Reviews Link-Up

December Reviews Link-Up

My Progress:


9 / 30 books. 30% done!

2024 Literary Escapes Challenge

- Alabama
- Alaska
- Arizona
- Arkansas
- California (3)
- Colorado (1)
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Florida
- Georgia
- Hawaii
- Idaho (2)
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Kansas
- Kentucky
- Louisiana (1)
- Maine (1)
- Maryland
- Massachusetts (1)
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Mississippi
- Missouri
- Montana
- Nebraska
- Nevada
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- New Mexico
- New York (1)
- North Carolina (1)
- North Dakota
- Ohio
- Oklahoma
- Oregon (2)
- Pennsylvania
- Rhode Island
- South Carolina
- South Dakota
- Tennessee (1)
- Texas (1)
- Utah
- Vermont
- Virginia (1)
- Washington
- West Virginia
- Wisconsin
- Wyoming
- Washington, D.C.*

International:
- Australia (1)
- Canada (1)
- England (5)
- France (1)
- Ireland (1)
- Scotland (1)
- The Netherlands (1)

My Progress:


12 / 51 states. 24% done!

2024 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge

My Progress:


10 / 50 words. 20% done!

2024 POPSUGAR Reading Challenge


15 / 50 books. 30% done!

Booklist Queen's 2024 Reading Challenge

My Progress:


32 / 50 books. 64% done!

2024 52 Club Reading Challenge

My Progress:


27 / 52 books. 52% done!

2024 Build Your Library Reading Challenge

My Progress:


21 / 40 books. 53% done!

2024 Pioneer Book Reading Challenge


13 / 40 books. 33% done!

2024 Craving for Cozies Reading Challenge

My Progress:


5 / 25 books. 20% done!

2024 Medical Examiner's Mystery Reading Challenge

2024 Mystery Marathon Reading Challenge

My Progress


17 / 26.2 miles. 65% done!

Mount TBR Reading Challenge

My Progress


15 / 100 books. 15% done!

2024 Pick Your Poison Reading Challenge

My Progress:


34 / 104 books. 33% done!

Around the Year in 52 Books Reading Challenge

My Progress


31 / 52 books. 60% done!

Disney Animated Movies Reading Challenge

My Progress


32 / 165 books. 19% done!
Friday, May 31, 2019

Epic Novel About Korea's Female Free-Divers Expansive, But Intimate

(Image from Barnes & Noble)

The Korean island of Jeju boasts an abundance of three things: wind, stones, and women.  In its matrifocal society, women known as haenyeo plunge into the sea—as they have for centuries—probing its depths in search of treasures like abalone, urchins, and octopus.  These delicacies are sold at market, making money for the women, their families, and the community.  Spots on the island's various all-female diving collectives are coveted, the honor passed down from mother to daughter.  It's a risky, all-consuming line of work.  While the women engage in hundreds of dangerous free dives over their lifetimes, their men stay behind to look after their homes and children.  Husbands may be given an allowance by their wives, but it's the latter that does all the bread-winning. 

Kim Young-Sook cannot wait to follow in her mother's footsteps and become part of the Hado collective, of which her mother is the leader.  She and her best friend, Han Mi-ja, are thrilled to become "baby divers" when they turn 15.  Being inducted into this exclusive community of women means inclusion, acceptance, and belonging.  Under the warm tutelage of the older women, Young-Sook and Mi-ja learn the fine arts of diving, collecting, and surviving in dangerous waters.  As the girls become proficient divers, even traveling to different countries to take lucrative diving jobs, they become closer than ever before.  But, as they grow up, their very different lives become even more divergent, until their paths no longer cross at all.  By the time they are wives and mothers, the estranged friends are doing all they can to survive the growing violence on their island as well as the more intimate concerns of poverty, abuse, child care, increasing restrictions on diving, and the clash between tradition and modernity that will change their island irrevocably.  The friendship that could sustain—and save—them both is tenuous, but is it truly gone forever?   

The Island of Sea Women, an epic novel by Lisa See, explores the friendship between two remarkable women over the course of several momentous decades.  Rich with detail about Jeju, the haenyeo, and Korea's tumultuous history, the novel is expansive and intimate at the same time.  The culture it explores is fascinating, the story it tells heartbreaking, but empowering.  Although The Island of Sea Women isn't a quick read, it's beautiful, absorbing, and unforgettable.  I loved it.

If you're interested in learning more about the haenyeo (a tradition/culture that still exists today, although the divers are now mostly old women), there are several videos you can watch on YouTube.  The one below gives a quick peek at what the divers do, but there are others that explore the culture in more depth.  



(Readalikes:  I haven't read much about Korea at all, let alone about the haenyeo, so I'm not sure what to compare this book to.  Suggestions?)

Grade:


If this were a movie, it would be rated:


for violence, blood/gore, mild sexual content, and disturbing subject matter

To the FTC, with love:  I bought a copy of The Island of Sea Women from Amazon with a portion of the millions I make from my lucrative career as a book blogger.  Ha ha.

Blog Widget by LinkWithin


Reading

<i>Reading</i>
End of Story by A.J. Finn

Listening

<i>Listening</i>
My Contrary Mary by Brodi Ashton, Cynthia Hand, and Jodi Meadows



Followin' with Bloglovin'

Follow

Followin' with Feedly

follow us in feedly



Grab my Button!


Blog Design by:


Blog Archive



2024 Reading Challenge

2024 Reading Challenge
Susan has read 0 books toward her goal of 200 books.
hide

2023 - Middle Grade Fiction

2023 - Middle Grade Fiction

2022 - Middle Grade Fiction

2022 - Middle Grade Fiction

2021 - Middle Grade Fiction

2021 - Middle Grade Fiction

2020 - Middle Grade Fiction

2020 - Middle Grade Fiction