Having read the blurb and back cover, I expected this book to be about Janie's search for her sister, Hannah, and the unraveling of the curse that causes their family to "lose a sister in every generation since the Japanese occupation" of Korea. However, the book was much more about the family relationships and the father's cancer diagnosis and gradual decline. This is unfortunately the second book I have read this week about which the advance information implied a mystery to solve that was not delivered by the novel. On a related note, I wish publishers would just be honest about what the book is about. Most of us would read it anyway and for those who would not, I would think you'd prefer they skip it than have a negative feeling about your house or your author. /rant
What this book did deliver was a touching and poignant relationship between father and daughter and between the two sisters. Both sisters had notions about each other, who was more loved, who was more free to be themselves, who had it better growing up, that turned out to not necessarily be the case. Their father's illness caused them to become closer and face some things about their relationship and also about themselves that they had been hiding from. I found Janie, the first person narrator to be genuine and relatable with actual flaws and a dynamic arc.
The writing is beautiful and elegant, elevating the miserable and depressing parts about the father's illness and the sisters' ugly arguments. It also lends the anecdotes of past events (which there are many) a dreamlike and parable-like quality, which I would characterize as very Eastern.
One other mildly irritating thing was the lack of proper names. Mother, Father, Grandmother, Uncle, "Big Cousin"...we never learn their real names. The narrator tells long anecdotes about her family referring to them only by their relationship to herself. At times this is awkward and confusing, particularly when telling a story that involves "my mother's grandmother" and "my grandmother's mother", who are, of course, the same person, as well as "my mother's grandmother's sister." Had the author given these people names, it would be more clear to the reader whom was being spoken of. We never even learn the narrator's last name.
Besides this and the fact that there isn't really any resolution to the curse of the multiple lost sisters, I enjoyed reading about Janie and Hannah and their family. I was thrilled to learn more about Korea and the Korean way of life, which I don't know much about. My favorite parts were when Janie related some fable her parents or grandmother had told her when she was a child.
I would recommend this book to fans of novels about family relationships, but not those who are expecting a good mystery.