Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-Reum

Format: 309 pages, Paperback

Published: April 22, 2025 by Bloomsbury Publishing

Litfic/own

This book had calm pace, and sure not a lot happened, but it was good and sometimes you will just drift along.

It is about Yeongju who is burned out and opens a bookstore. At first it goes, not so well, but little by little she finds herself and the bookstore starts to to become a place people wants to visit.

She meets new people who becomes friends. The man who cant find a job and becomes a barista. A student unsure about his path in life, a office guy turned writer, a woman who turns about and just stares for hours. They all have their reason and they all fall in love with the bookshop.

Have I heard about Korean work ethics? Sure, but damn, no wonder people are burned out. And there is a lot of talk about that here. People who work until midnight, go home and start again. People who have non permanent positions but are not given real ones because they are easy to fire. And then those who downtrade, they have a better job but then do a lesser one. But are happier, still society values those better jobs more.

Will this bookshop thrive? Who knows, but Yeongju and the people she has met will do their best.

I enjoyed it, but yes it is a slower one and about people. You just have to go with the flow.

Yeongju is burned out. With her high-­flying career, demanding marriage, and busy life in Seoul, she knows she should feel successful, but all she feels is drained. Yet an abandoned dream nags at her, and in a leap of faith, she leaves her old life behind. After quitting her job and divorcing her husband, Yeongju moves to a small residential neighborhood outside the city, where she opens the Hyunam-dong Bookshop.

For the first few months all Yeongju does is cry, but the long hours in the shop also give her time to mull over what makes a good bookseller and store. As she starts to read hungrily, host author events, and develop her own bookselling philosophy, she eases into her new setting. Surrounded by friends, writers, and the books that connect them all, she finds her new story as the Hyunam-dong Bookshop transforms into an inviting space for lost souls to rest, heal, and remember it's never too late to scrap the plot and start again.