From the Bookshelf of Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge…

The Island of Sea Women

Lisa See

Start date: March 1, 2022

Finish date: March 31, 2022

Discussion: 2022 Monthly Group Reads

Why we're reading this: March 2022 group read for a book featuring a nonpatriarchal society.
[close] March 2022 group read for a book featuring a nonpatriarchal society.

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2022 Monthly Group Reads

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What Members Thought

Mar 24, 2022 Jaime rated it it was amazing

Shelves: historical-fiction, womens-fiction, historical-1930-1950, historical-1950-1980, poc-author, korean-war, asian-literature, korea, grief, motherhood

From a distance, this is a story about the Korean island of Jeju and the Haenyeo (female divers), but at its heart, this is a story about one diver in particular. Young-sook is born the daughter of a well-regarded diver who eventually becomes the leader of their group. Young-sook's mother takes another girl under her wing, Mi-ja, the daughter of a Japanese collaborator who lives with an aunt and uncle who treat her like little more than a slave.

Young-sook and Mi-ja become the closest of friends ...more

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Mar 10, 2021 Melissa rated it really liked it

This novel was recommended to me at the beginning of 2020 and I finally got around to reading it about a year later. I was dragging my feet on it for a while because I am terrified of deep sea diving (I won't even go snorkeling for that matter) and the topic doesn't really interest me. However, Lisa See found a way to make it sound fascinating.

The premise of this novel was really interesting. I learned a lot of new things about haenyeos ("hen-yo") and deep sea diving. I even went online afterwar ...more

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Jan 24, 2022 Nicole rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Beautiful. And heartbreaking. In the end, I cried. Fascinating to read about a culture I knew nothing of (haenyeo) and to learn more about Korea and its history.

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