What's hot in Hangul?

December 20, 2007 10:29 PM

Korean Book Gift Filter: What Korean books (meaning books written in Hangul) should I get for my parents?

I figured I'd swing by the Korean bookstore tomorrow to get gifts for the folks. (Yeah, I know it's late, but they're not really that big on Christmas, so I wasn't all that .)

Unfortunately, while I can read Korean phonetically, I don't know the language well enough to be able to tell if a book would be interesting to them or not. So, I was hoping someone could suggest something. If not, I'll probably just pick books that are translations of originally English books that I know something about.

They're not super picky. They both enjoy popular fiction. My dad leans slightly toward books about history and religion, and my mom toward biographies and stories of personal struggle.

So what's good?

posted by ignignokt to writing & language (5 comments total)

Well, a biography of 이명박, who won the presidential election yesterday, and rose from poverty to chaebol boss to, now, president-elect, would be timely and cover most of the bases. Even though he's a douchebag.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 11:33 PM on December 20, 2007 [1 favorite]

I've given the Harry Potter series in Hangul as gifts before.
posted by malaprohibita at 2:51 AM on December 21, 2007

oops. sorry. didn't read the question fully before posting.
posted by malaprohibita at 2:52 AM on December 21, 2007

A scan of the bestseller lists actually indicate that most of the bestsellers are translations of foreign titles, which has been the case for the past 5+ years, alas. If you're looking for Korean books by Korean authors, perhaps this or this? One's a non-traditional family drama, one's a historical novel, and being bestsellers, they'll probably be carried by your bookstore.
posted by suedehead at 9:48 AM on December 21, 2007

Thanks, everyone. I'll look for all of these things. Harry Potter might not be a bad idea, either.
posted by ignignokt at 5:32 PM on December 21, 2007