RaveThe Star TribuneE.J. Koh’s memoir, The Magical Language of Others, is a haunting, gorgeous narrative that is lonely but lushly told. A coming-of-age story, it brings us through scenes that read like elegant fairy tales ... Koh’s poeticism shines throughout the memoir with startling images that anchor the human characters to the world almost like dolls in a dollhouse ... Throughout this brilliant memoir, Koh offers brief meditations on the magic of language as a kind of fortress of solitude.
Anuradha Roy
RaveThe Minneapolis Star TribuneRoy writes beautifully. Western readers looking for the 'exotic,' 'colorful' and 'tragic' Orient full of Hollywood fantasies need to look elsewhere. Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love) is, thankfully, nowhere to be found. Roy’s style is confident, and she trusts the reader to follow her characters because their paths are compelling ... Many small narrative moments of surprise and fresh, original language keep the reader engaged. One of the haunting pleasures of this book is how time dilates and refracts, how the stories of the characters act as prisms, illuminating sharp moments of pleasure, recognition and suffering.
Han Kang
RaveThe Minneapolis Star TribuneHan’s striking language has a purity, especially when it touches into the deep melancholia that is part of South Korea’s modern inheritance, in its explorations of the psyche in flux ... a remarkable novel with universal themes about isolation, obsession, duty and desire.
