Publishers Weekly
08/14/2023
Kim follows up The Last Story of Mina Lee with an ambitious if unwieldy look at the lives of the Korean-American Kim family: patriarch John; his wife, Sunny; and their children, college-age Ana and high school senior Ronald. The action kicks off in 1999 Los Angeles, a year after Sunny has left the family with little explanation. One afternoon, John discovers a body in the family’s backyard, and in the dead man’s hand is a letter addressed to Sunny. Police are quick to declare the death an accident and move on, but Ana and Ronald are eager to identify the deceased and find out what linked him to their mother. Flashbacks to the 1970s flesh out John and Sunny’s relationship, their early lives in Korea, and Sunny’s difficulty adjusting to America when she and John arrive in Los Angeles. Kim sets a laundry list of worthy themes in her crosshairs—including racial discrimination, police corruption, and the struggles of Asian women in and out of the family—and explores them sensitively, but sometimes stumbles in wedding those themes to the novel’s plot. The resulting speed bumps aren’t a deal-breaker, but they make it difficult to remain engaged in the central mystery. Still, strong prose and evident passion make this worthwhile. Agent: Amy Bishop, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret. (Oct.)
From the Publisher
“What We Kept to Ourselves is both a suspenseful page-turner and a poignant family drama. Kim's beautiful, thoughtful prose illuminates themes of immigration, identity, love, and loss. A gorgeous, thrilling read!”—Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of Girl In Translation
“Bursting with yearning, twists, and secrets, What We Kept to Ourselves is about the difficult questions that die in our throats when it comes to asking our loved ones. A triumph!”—Frances Cha, author of If I Had Your Face
“A gorgeous literary novel featuring poetic prose and a propulsive mystery. What We Kept to Ourselves is a moving story about immigration, family secrets, and human connection. Truly a masterpiece that I couldn’t put down.”—Emiko Jean, author of Mika in Real Life
"A powerful tribute to the bonds between the least privileged, each page of What We Kept to Ourselves pulses with stunning detail and deep insight. I couldn't put it down."—Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, bestselling author of On the Rooftop
“Kim's second novel is hard to put down, unique, haunting, and beautifully written, as the author slowly weaves layer upon layer in an intricate, mysterious web.”—Booklist, starred review
“Layers after layers of mystery are revealed with each chapter of this exquisitely written novel. What We Kept to Ourselves is a compelling, poetic, important, thought-provoking, and unforgettable read. Nancy Jooyoun Kim is a master storyteller who has the power to keep us spellbound and reminds us what we must do to make this world a better place.”—Nguyen Phan Que Mai, internationally bestselling author of The Mountains Sing and Dust Child
"Nancy Jooyoun Kim has crafted a moving, propulsive story about a family haunted by secrets. What We Kept To Ourselves spans the intimately personal to the urgently political to investigate how the traumas of the past shape the human experience. This is a probing, sharp novel about family, loss, desire, grief, the search for justice, and so much more."—Crystal Hana Kim, author of If You Leave Me
“Nancy Jooyoun Kim’s What We Kept to Ourselves illuminates the glacial secrets among a family that crackle under a glass lens. Through the brushstrokes of tragedy and grief and mystery, Kim interrogates how a forgotten past bleeds into the choices we make in our everyday lives."—E. J. Koh, author of The Liberators
“What We Kept to Ourselves is a nail-biting thriller with hairpin turns, a generational saga, a love story, an unsparing look at belonging and unbelonging in America today and the abject joys of food, family, forgiveness. I can’t stop thinking about the Kim family. A glorious achievement!” —Marie Myung-Ok Lee, author of The Evening Hero
"A propulsive mystery about yearning, loneliness, and duty (but to and for whom?). Kim is a masterful wordsmith, tackling brittle topics with grace, urgency, and most importantly, hope. This book is a call to action, and a reminder that it's never too late to live the life you've always wanted."—Carolyn Huynh, author of The Fortunes of Jaded Women
"Those of us who love southern California know it's an entire universe where people's dreams and loves and families orbit and dance and collide in neighborhoods as diverse as the world. Nancy Jooyoun Kim knows Los Angeles so deeply that her novel brings to life loquat trees, the melancholy of staying where new roots sometimes cannot flourish, and the geography of neighbors and strangers whose loyalties turn into what might be love." —Susan Straight, National Book Award Finalist and author of In the Country of Women
"What We Kept to Ourselves is an intricately crafted mystery and a heart-wrenching family saga. Nancy Jooyoun Kim writes with a piercing moral clarity, suffusing every page with emotional depth. Fiery, bittersweet and complex, this is a novel of incredible conviction and empathy."—Michelle Min Sterling, New York Times bestselling author Camp Zero
"What We Keep to Ourselves is a breathtaking literary force of a novel. With melodious prose, Nancy Jooyoun Kim has crafted a page-turning mystery with thoughtful meditations on family, love, and connection. This novel is a searing portrait on how long-buried secrets, desperate hopes, and blind compromises shape the decisions that affect generations to come. Kim is a master storyteller!"—Catherine Adel West, author of Saving Ruby King
author of Girl In Translation Jean Kwok
What We Kept to Ourselves is both a suspenseful page-turner and a poignant family drama. Kim’s beautiful, thoughtful prose illuminates themes of immigration, identity, love, and loss...[a] thrilling read.”
NOVEMBER 2023 - AudioFile
Jennifer Kim narrates this story of the Kim family. In 1999, the Korean immigrants are struggling with the disappearance of their matriarch, Sunny, a year earlier. Kim captures all the raw emotion of a family that is having a difficult time connecting in the midst of a crisis. When a deceased Black man is found in the Kims' backyard with a note addressed to Sunny by his side, members of the family investigate, at their peril, to discover the man's relationship to the family. Flashbacks give Kim a chance to shine at depicting the prejudice and racism of the immigrant experience. This slow burn of a narration packs social commentary into a compelling plot. L.M.G. © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2023-07-13
The year-old disappearance of a Korean immigrant woman in Los Angeles is still a mystery to her family when a dead Black man with a letter addressed to her appears in their yard.
Sunhee “Sunny” Kim did not seem like the kind of mother who would vanish without a word from the lives of her daughter, Ana, a college graduate, and her son, Ronald—but there is much about the family's situation that is, as the title of Kim's second novel suggests, hidden from view. Sunny's relationship with her husband, John, a man deeply damaged by the atrocities and dislocations of the Korean War, is far from nurturing, and the family has not recovered from the burning of their gas station during the Rodney King riots. The complicated timeline, moving between the end of 1999 and earlier periods going back to 1977, very gradually provides answers to myriad questions: Why did Sunny leave? What was her relationship to the dead homeless man, Ronald “RJ” Jones, after whom she named her son, letting her husband believe it was for Ronald Reagan? Why was RJ estranged from his daughter, Rhonda, whose quest for answers about the father she never knew becomes entwined with Ana and Ronald’s? What was the exposé RJ was working on about the LAPD, where he was a janitor in the 1980s, and did he hide his evidence with Sunny, and is this why people are being mysteriously followed and murdered in the days after his death? If it sounds very complicated, it really is, and Kim doles out answers very, very slowly, spending a great deal of time reviewing and rereviewing the thoughts of each character, often having them consider stiffly phrased political questions. “While she had been speaking with Priscilla, the realization—that Ana, too, was a beneficiary of this specific system under which so many like RJ had been harmed—crept throughout her body. She had worked hard, yes, and up until high school, displayed excellence in all the subjects that centered the perspectives and accomplishments of gatekeepers (mostly, straight white men).” When answers to our questions finally come, in intense, violent scenes at the end of the book, it is a welcome relief.
A potentially propulsive tale suffers from a slow reveal and too many public service announcements.