On the Eve of Goodbye

A Novel

Kyung-Sook Shin

From the million-copy bestselling author of Please Look After Mom, an unforgettable novel about creativity, belonging and human connection.

In three corners of the world, three women sit down to write letters.

In New Jersey, an older Korean American woman sits at home during a hurricane, her electricity and water cut off, branches and debris swirling outside her window. She lights candles against the dark and, in a letter to an old friend, reflects on a quiet life scarred by modern history.

In Germany, a younger Korean writer sits restlessly in a hotel room. She has come to this country to visit a dying friend who now cannot bear to be seen. Desperate to show how much she cares, she writes a letter recounting their deep friendship.

In coastal Jeju, an artist sits in a friend's bright, beautiful studio feeling wrung out with grief, to answer the letter she has been avoiding for many years.

Weaving together the lives of three artists to explore creativity, belonging and human connection, On the Eve of Goodbye is a moving, wise and tender novel about both the homes we live in and the homes that live in us, from one of Korea's most loved authors.

Kyung-Sook Shin is one of South Korea’s most widely read and acclaimed novelists. She is the author of I’ll Be Right There and Please Look After Mom, which was a New York Times bestseller and a Man Asian Literary Prize winner.

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Endorsements & Reviews

Praise for Kyung-Sook Shin

"A moving delve into a lonely psyche. With writing raw and sophisticated, tenderhearted and clear-eyed. Vividly translated by Anton Hur, Shin Kyung-Sook's novel is also an intimate, sideways portrait of Seoul through the eyes of a rural outsider who roams the bright lights and big city not in pursuit of ambitious dreams, but seeking care and human touch."" Y. Z. Chin, author of Edge Case 

“Shin writes about a time and setting that may seem remote to many Americans, but in many ways her specificity is universal; we all have a monster that has no face, and which we try to avoid. Shin paints her own monster for us.” The New York Times Book Review

“Kyung-sook Shin's work often inhabits the space between story and reality. Though the autobiographical novel is a well-worn genre, Shin handles it with the sort of effortless ruthlessness a story like this requires, without letting either the narrator or the reader rest easy about the line between truth and fiction. It's no wonder that despite being grounded in signposts of the everyday, The Girl Who Wrote Loneliness has the tenor of a ghost story. Shin anchors her narrator in vivid details rather than narrative absolutes. A haunting, remarkable novel.” National Public Radio 

“Darkly beautiful,Violets explores the toll of abandonment and the relentless marginalization of a helpless young woman. The protagonist, San, shivers with insecurity and loneliness but still dares, briefly, to dream of friendship and a normal life. Shin writes of the cruelty and dangers of disempowerment, and an ensuing spiral of despair.” Frances Cha, author of If I Had Your Face

“The most moving and accomplished, and often startling, novel in translation I’ve read in many seasons. Every sentence is saturated in detail.”

The Wall Street Journal

"An aching, atmospheric novel about grief and longing. Oh San, our main character, navigates a life of haunting loneliness and yet she finds tender moments of true beauty. In this slim and powerful book, Kyung-Sook Shin deftly explores the violence of life—of shedding childhood, of becoming a woman, of searching for identity in a shifting world. A beautiful translation by Anton Hur. Go read this book! Crystal Hana Kim, author of If You Leave