Crying in H Mart
2020
- singers
- rock musicians
- biography
- korean americans
- autobiographies
- biography & memoir
- food memoir & travel
- nyt:combined-print-and-e-book-nonfiction=2021-05-09
- koreans, united states
- rock musicians, biography
The story
In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up one of the few Asian American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother’s particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother’s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food. As she grew up, moving to the East Coast for college, finding work in the restaurant industry, and performing gigs with her fledgling band–and meeting the man who would become her husband–her Koreanness began to feel ever more distant, even as she found the life she wanted to live. It was her mother’s diagnosis of terminal cancer, when Michelle was twenty-five, that forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her. Vivacious and plainspoken, lyrical and honest, Zauner’s voice is as radiantly alive on the page as it is onstage. Rich with intimate anecdotes that will resonate widely, and complete with family photos, Crying in H Mart is a book to cherish, share, and reread. ([source](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/612676/crying-in-h-mart-by-michelle-zauner/))
What it’s like
Warm, sensory prose that lingers over food: the sizzle of banchan, the steam from a bowl of seaweed soup, the glow of a crowded Korean grocery aisle, all rendered in a plainspoken, candid voice that moves easily between wry humor and sudden ache. The mood is tender and bittersweet, a grief book that feels intimate rather than bleak, best suited to a slow Sunday afternoon, a late-night read with the kitchen light on, or a reread when you want to feel close to family and home. The pacing is conversational and episodic, drifting between childhood in Oregon, a formative stretch in a Seoul apartment, and the years of a mother's illness, with small domestic moments carrying the emotional weight. Its people are shaped by hard love and misunderstanding, and the arc follows a daughter slowly reclaiming a heritage she had pushed away. Intensity is low: illness and loss are present and handled with restraint, with no violence and no sexual content, though the grief is heavy and sustained. Written for readers who love food writing, memoir with a strong voice, and stories about mothers, cooking, and cultural identity.
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