Linda Sue Park's 1999 first novel SeeSaw Girl is a melancholy study of gender and coming-of-age in seventeenth-century Joseon Korea, with glimpses of European travelers, elite life, painting, embroidery, and how we make do with what we can—oh, and just how awesome Korean seesaws are!
Tag: Genre: Historical Fiction
Reading “A Single Shard” by Linda Sue Park
Linda Sue Park's Newbery Medal-winning 2001 novel A Single Shard is mundane, quiet, cerebral, and touching. One of the few novels from my childhood I regularly return to, it is a brilliant, emotional examination of pottery, poverty, and community in 13th century Korea.
Reading “Here Be Dragons” by Sharon Kay Penman (Welsh Princes 1)
Sharon Kay Penman's Here By Dragon is a classic of historical fiction, offering a rich, complex tapestry of medieval Welsh and Anglo-Norman life, with a unique narrative style that decenters the big moments and focuses on domestic life and character psychology, and has a lot to say about medieval women's lives.
Reading “The Captive” by Skomantas (Tales from the Baltic 1)
The first in an obscure 1990s Lithuanian historical fiction series published in English, The Captive proves mildly interesting, poorly written, and narratively simple, but might be worth a look if you're interested in the pre-Christian Baltic.
Reading “The Blue Fox” by Sjón
Sjón's The Blue Fox is a compelling English translation of the Icelandic original, a magical realist historical fantasy that brings Icelandic folklore to life in a rural 19th century setting and features a rare representation of a character with Down syndrome.
Genre Fantasies 