Three Generations of Railway Workers

Nominated for the International Booker Prize, Hwang Sok-yong skillfully weaves the story of one family into the history of Korea, making the railway a symbol of progress that brings both benefit and harm.

In this novel, whose characters sometimes interact with real historical figures and sometimes with ghosts, the most significant events of Korean history of the 20th and 21st centuries are reflected.

Several generations of the Lee family gradually struggle against Japanese, American, and South Korean authorities for the right to live freely and with dignity in their country.
The main idea of the novel is voiced by one of the characters:
«This imperfect world always changes in ways we wish it wouldn’t. But even that takes too much time. We are merely specks in the endless flow of time.»

«A grand and all-encompassing novel about Korea, as we rarely see it in the West»
Judge of the International Booker Prize.