Quotes from Min Jin Lee

This sound, the sound of her own voice, felt familiar, not because it was her own voice but because it reminded her of all the times she'd gone to the market as a girl - first with her father, later by herself as a young woman, then as a lover yearning for the gaze of her beloved.

I find that in life, even the most unsympathetic person has a clear delineation of his motives, however complex and unappealing, but to him, there is a moral clarity to his actions. I think part of my job as a storyteller is to recognize the congruity or incongruity of his motives and behavior and somehow still be fair to the character and to the reader.

he believed that a man must learn constantly. He loathed waste of any kind,

too far away. All good marriages, the matchmaker supposed, but her sons were lazy. Not like Hoonie. After

You like pajeon? [...] How does your umma make it?" Kyunghee asked; her tone was casual, though she held strong opinions about the ratio of scallions to shellfish.

She longed to see her sons as they were back then: their legs chubby and white, their mushroom haircuts misshapen because they could never sit still at the barber. She wished she could take back the times she had scolded her children just because she was tired. There were so many errors. If life allowed revisions, she would let them stay in their bath a little longer, read them one more story before bed, and fix them another plate of shrimp.

The gentle eyes beneath the jutting cheekbones and scaly skin were the same.

people from islands are different. We have more freedom.

Learning was like playing, not labor.

Now that he was gone, Sunja held on to her father's warmth and kind words like polished gems.

always expect suffering, and just keep working hard

If you act like a fool and go against my interests, then I can't protect you

History has failed us, but no matter. Kyunghee would be waiting for her at home. -Pachinko

The more she got to know this man, the more she realized that the man she'd loved as a girl was an idea she'd had of him - feelings without any verification.

owner believed

He would continue to suffer with love.

Is it so terrible to be Korean?" "It is terrible to be me.

Learn everything. Fill your mind with knowledge - it's the only kind of power no one can take away from you.

I'm a businessman. And I wat you to be a businessman. And whenever you go to these meetings, I want you to think for yourself, and I want you to think about promoting your own interests no matter what. All these people both the Japanese and the Koreans - are fucked because they keep thinking about the group. But here's the truth: There's no such thing as a benevolent leader. I protect you because you work for me.

There were so many errors. If life allowed revisions, she would let them stay in their bath a little longer, read them one more story before bed, and fix them another plate of shrimp.

She had loved Hansu, and then she had loved Isak. However, what she felt for her boys, Noa and Mozasu, was more than the love she felt for the men; this love for her children felt like life and death. After Noa had gone, she felt half-dead. She could not imagine any mother feeling differently.

There wasn't a day when she didn't think of her father or hear his voice in her head.

There was something plush and sensual about his thickly rounded arms and swollen belly; it might have been the smoothness of his clear, tawny skin, or the way he fit into a well-made suit, resembling a self-satisfied seal gliding across a city street. He was a good talker—the sort of man who could sell lumber to a woodcutter.

Yoseb could understand the boy's anger, but he wanted another chance to talk to him, to tell Noa that a man must learn to forgive - to know what is important, that to live without forgiveness was a kind of death with breathing and movement.