Kim Jee-hye
Union Square & Co
7 October 2025
224
eBook - PDF
Contemporary Fiction
ARC via Edelweiss
With good books, good food and companionship, the Book Kitchen fills people's tired souls. Yoojin, who grew up in Seoul, opened the Book Kitchen by chance in Soyangri, a village two hours from Seoul by car. The Book Kitchen functions as a bookshop and cafe. The second function of the Book Kitchen is a Book Stay, where one can stay overnight in one of the building’s four complexes.
Over the course of one year, multiple characters each find comfort and hope at Yoojin’s Book Kitchen. From a music idol facing an identity crisis, to a promising lawyer beset by an unsettling medical diagnosis, to a young, failed music director who has had to rein in his dreams, they happen upon Soyangri at pivotal moments in their lives.
Soyangri Book Kitchen by Kim Jee-hye is the next in what is now a long line of cosy 'healing' reads translated from Japanese and Korean. The trend seems nowhere near ending, but I feel like, personally, I am getting to the end of my endurance for them. I loved them at first, but now they are beginning to all blur into one. On the positive side for Soyangri Book Kitchen, I really loved the idea of a cafe-bookstore countryside retreat where you could spend a weekend (or longer) to unwind and reconnect with yourself. It was a good premise with a lot of potential. The visitors in the story were mostly people at a cross-roads in their lives who needed to pause for a moment to recharge and take stock before deciding the best way forward. Their stories were interesting, and yet I didn't deeply connect with any of them, I think mostly because of the sense that I felt I had read this all before in other similar works and already knew how things would pan out. And that was essential the negative for me: that I didn't feel there was much new here to really spark my curiosity. Nonetheless, it was a sweet and pleasant read and I am giving it four stars. If you love this style of literature, you will definitely find this one good reading too.
I received this book as a free eBook ARC via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.
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