GOOD OLD-FASHIONED KOREAN SPIRIT

A group of young people in South Korea in 1985 come together for a traditional holiday and learn they have more in common than they knew.

College student Taehee isn’t getting along with her dad. She isn’t allowed to date; he barely even trusts her with her friends. Still, she manages to have a secret boyfriend, Kiwoo, who’s very supportive—even when she brings up the idea of tricking the members of their masked folk dance team into participating in her grandmother’s eerie Daeboreum full-moon holiday ceremony. Taehee’s mom forces her to take part in the old tradition, which involves spending the night at Halmoni’s “haunted persimmon farm”—and facing some sort of sacrifice. The setting is rich and immersive; against a backdrop of everyday interpersonal angst and misunderstandings, the story covers political events, such as protests against the book-banning military dictatorship. One team member’s father deems the dance club insufficiently manly, there’s a shaman exorcism, and a transracial Korean American adoptee experiences cultural clashes. Daeboreum becomes more than just a tradition about scaring away evil spirits that Taehee’s grandmother and her friends pull the young people into—it’s also a time for found family to persevere and confront past horrors. The colorful, cartoonlike illustration style is attractive but at times feels dissonant with the story’s themes and doesn’t quite do justice to the strengths of this touching book.

A hopeful and entertaining exploration of a difficult era.