Library Journal - Audio
★ 06/10/2024
Young Lions Award winner Yoon's third short story collection (following 2017's The Mountain), narrated by Raymond J. Lee, transports listeners into a breathtaking tapestry of worlds, exploring the complicated communities of the Korean diaspora. The seven stories feature characters with rich inner lives, engaging with longing, loss, and hope as they search for belonging. "At the Post Station" features a Japanese samurai who travels with a boy soon to return to Korea, and in "Bosun," a formerly incarcerated man settles in a small Upstate New York town in the mountains. Other stories feature Korean shop owners in London who work far too hard and a maid in Spain who agrees to spy on a Russian prizefighter who could be her son. Lee honors Yoon's simple but beautifully crafted language, providing a soulful narration that taps into the melancholic and meditative atmosphere. VERDICT This haunting collection, featuring complex individuals caught between cultures, is a gem, recommended for any collection of audio short stories. A good pick for those who enjoyed Te-Ping Chen's Land of Big Numbers and Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry's What Isn't Remembered.—Scott DiMarco
BookRiot
Yoon weaves complex tales of belonging and identity, of cultures clashing and building upon each other to create the multitudes that exist within communities.”
From the Publisher
The Hive and the Honey is much more than an exquisite, beautiful collection of short stories. Yoon roves geographic and historical points, catching stories of the Korean diaspora and, in the best way, the way of great literature, locates narratives that would disappear forever if he didn't find them, characters far from home, longing for home, finding ways to reconcile and embrace complex new landscapes. This is a book about all of us. If you let each of these wonderful stories into your soul, you'll feel the way I felt when I read this collection. I was in the hands of a vivid, powerfully honed imagination and came out better, more human, having learned something new about the world.
—David Means, author of Two Nurses, Smoking
"The stories in The Hive and the Honey are geographically and temporally diverse. Each opens an inviting door to a seemingly calm moment in life, only to cast the readers into the deep and murkey undercurrent of history. Amid violence are moments of gentleness; underneath darkness and bleakness are glimpses of light and humor. Yoon is a beautiful and beguiling writer, and should be called a national—or, international—treasure!
—Yiyun Li, Author of A Thousand Years of Good Prayers