Publishers Weekly
10/07/2024
A group of women navigate the pressure to be perfect mothers in this piercing domestic drama from Gu (The Old Woman with the Knife). The story unfolds in an experimental communal apartment complex outside Seoul, where residents are expected to have at least three children in exchange for government subsidies. Yojin, a pharmacy cashier, moves in with her husband, Euno, a frustrated filmmaker and stay-at-home dad, and their six-year-old daughter, Siyul. They join three other families, all chosen by lottery as part of a pilot program to help boost the country’s birth rate. Yojin resents how Siyul, as the oldest among the four families’ children, is saddled with watching the younger kids in the communal daycare run by Danhui. Tensions increase as Yojin begins to suspect that Danhui’s husband, Jaegang, is hitting on her. Meanwhile, freelance illustrator Hyonae cannot find time to work amid the demands of mothering, and her neighbor Gyowon faces criticism online after she seeks secondhand clothes and accessories for her children. Gu’s quick pacing tends to merely skim the surface, but as the women’s frustrations reach a boiling point, she keenly portrays the toll taken by gendered expectations. This is a perceptive novel of motherhood’s double binds. Agent: Marina Penalva, Cassnovas & Lynch. (Dec.)
From the Publisher
Reading this incisive, delicate and wholly original book, I found that words like ‘family’, ‘neighbor’, ‘nature’, and ‘community’ no longer evoked warm and bountiful images in me. They gave me a chill. And I know that this is reality.”—Cho Nam-joo, author of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982
“Gu Byeong-mo’s Apartment Women is a sharp examination of the boundary between the utopic ideals of community and the dystopian realities of late capitalism. The characters—beautifully drawn, full of flaws and wholly human—live side-by-side in a tense intimacy that haunted me long after I put the book down.”—Sarah Ruiz-Grossman, author of A Fire So Wild
“Gu Byeong-mo’s novel Apartment Women asks a provocative question. Rebelling against the social norms and conventions, she invites us to look again at things we have taken for granted.”—Hankyoreh Daily
“[Gu Byeong-mo] relentlessly reveals the dark side of the word ‘warm community’ that we have so far been using without questioning.”—Korea Herald
“Via breezy, engaging storytelling, Gu’s realist novel explores the roles of women, with protagonists who discuss parenting and work-life balance while contending with meeting social, cultural, and societal mores. Readers will eagerly follow this story through to see which couples, if any, succeed in meeting the concept behind this distinctive living situation. A good pick for book clubs.”—Library Journal
“Meticulously translated by prize-winning Kim, Gu’s bitingly perceptive observations about womanhood, wifehood, and motherhood adroitly provoke acute feelings of breathtaking claustrophobia amidst stifling societal expectations.”—Booklist
"Piercing... Keenly portrays the toll taken by gendered expectations. This is a perceptive novel of motherhood’s double binds."—Publishers Weekly
"Gu is an exciting writer in the contemporary renaissance in Korean art... A valuable look into the culture of communal living that has earned South Korea the nickname 'the republic of apartments,' this novel wisely invites readers into these spaces, to move through the design and derive its purpose for themselves."—New York Times Book Review
"A sharp critique of gender roles, parenthood, and shared responsibilities, inviting readers to reflect on the cultural expectations of women in South Korea."—PEN.org
Library Journal
10/01/2024
South Korean author Gu's (The Old Woman with the Knife) newest social novel focuses on four families living on the outskirts of Seoul in the government-run Dream Future Pilot Communal Apartments, where there's the expectation that each family will have at least three children within 10 years of residency in order to boost the national birth rate. At the start of the novel, none of the Dream Future Pilot couples has met the goal; each has only one or two children, ranging in ages from infancy to age 6. Each couple brings unique circumstances to the mix: a stay-at-home dad and working mom who are barely making ends meet, for example, or a mother who's trying to determine if one of the husbands, whom she commutes to work with, is indeed making unwanted advances towards her. The book draws readers further into this community as the families attempt to achieve a balance between home life and work life. VERDICT Via breezy, engaging storytelling, Gu's realist novel explores the roles of women, with protagonists who discuss parenting and work-life balance while contending with meeting social, cultural, and societal mores. Readers will eagerly follow this story through to see which couples, if any, succeed in meeting the concept behind this distinctive living situation. A good pick for book clubs.—Shirley Quan
DECEMBER 2024 - AudioFile
Nancy Wu's inviting narration brings listeners into the world of the first four families who move into a twelve-unit government housing complex outside of Seoul, South Korea. The story shifts among the perspectives of the four mothers, with primary focus on the newest resident, Yogin, and her neighbor, Hyonae. Wu portrays Yogin's efficient persona and contemplative nature as she struggles to balance the demands of her job as a pharmacy assistant and her new building's communal childcare duties. Wu wonderfully conveys the often-exasperated tone of Hyonae, a freelance illustrator who works from home, who has similar conflicts. The other mothers, who include a controlling supermom, are vibrantly presented in snapshots throughout the story. This powerful depiction of marriage, motherhood, and societal expectations packs a wallop. M.J. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine