Offerings: A Novel

It’s interesting, but I notice the writing style will probably be off putting for some because of grammar. Stream-of-thought can get away with quite a bit in this way, but I still find it distracting. It’s also bilingual, so if you don’t know that aboji is “father” and such then it’ll be quite confusing to those not familiar with Korean/Hangugeo. As any dual-linguist, they move back and forth quite a bit.The content is descriptive, giving much background and even nicknames for people. It’s definitely for a certain kind of reader.

Poetic writing, dramatic story. An important book on Asia.

Good read about a Korean family that sort of splits their lives in U.S. and Korea. Loyalty remains for the home land after education in the states. Heartaches about the hard times in the mother country, Korea. Interesting read and educated me about a country that know very little about. Family devotion and faithfulness is strong and never ending. Good saga, honestly written, and author knows a great deal about the connection and life lead.

This novel explores some events related to the IMF crisis (1997) in South Korea, from the perspective of a young Korean-American investment banker. Intertwined with this plot, which might have some quite realistic and interesting details since the author is a distinguished private equity pioneer who has focused his career on Korea and East Asia, there is a second plot that recounts the protagonist's personal story from Seoul to Fort Lee and from there to Harvard Business School and Wall Street. This is a well written story that offers unique insights into Korean society and history and vivid glimpses of what may have happened behind the scenes. It is also a poignant (fictionalized) memoir of family history and love.

The book actually matured towards the end. The articulation of the relationship between father and son was a story in itself. The author is a true lover of books, and philosophy, and it shows. It is a short read, looking forward to his next work which hopefully will have a bit more depth and focus.

reasonably interesting novel about a US raised Korean who works for the New York financial system and is called in to help restructure the debt load during the Asian financial crisis. Alternating chapters in slightly different voices, the one about being a young immigrant learning the language and American ways, the other about the hard-boiled negotiations in Seoul between the greed-ambition-and-competitive driven financiers and the national interests of his home country, complicated by his personal relations with a colleague from his days at the HBS who is potential heir to one of the big conglomerates, and his own feelings for the workers who are about to be downsized.

Michael ByungJu Kim's novel has some beautiful prose but I give it 2 1/2 stars because of two things: (1) the constant jumping around in time was very disruptive to the flow of the narrative, and (2) the overuse of Korean terms without much explanation. The book would have been so much more enjoyable was it more linear in the storytelling. It was a good story and interesting, though. I thought (and hoped) to learn more about Korea and its culture than I did. I feel I was suckered into reading it by Malcolm Gladwell's review. My bad but a good lesson for me to learn.

Intriguing, thoughtful story about a young man and deep thinker, Shane Daejoon Lee, who goes through inner conflicts between one’s trust and humanism, and discovers the place to settle with his soul mate.Dynamic setting during the Asian financial crisis, yet describes deep-in-hurt human relationships as the first son in the family, longtime friend with a conglomerate owner, and a man to be loved. This book gave me “fresh air.”

OFFERINGS by Michael ByungJu Kim is an amazing book. Kim is a powerful story-teller who shares insights, attitudes, and history of Korea – its culture, the bonds and cycles of father-son relationships, the North Korean threat, plus the main character’s (Dae Joon) conflicting ‘duties’ to father, to friend, to company, and to his native country. The parallel story-telling in differing times and settings was very effective. Kim creatively laces together enchanting tales of a young immigrant American from Korea adjusting to life in New Jersey, the drama of high-finance and wheeling-dealings of i-bankers aimed at saving the Korean economy, the traditional albeit complex courtship and romance of a lovely Korean ‘bride’ Jee Yeon, the loss of a father nearly coinciding with the birth of a son.OFFERINGS is majestic, action-packed and enthralling. Kim strings together a powerful and emotionally charged story in a truly effective manner. It was hard to separate fact from fiction, real life experience from the imagined, real-world from dreamworld, but therein lies a wonderful accomplishment with OFFERINGS.

This was a book I enjoyed reading. It had moments of almost poetic heart touching words & other times full of the logistics of investment banking, Was it like real life? Times when we struggle to balance our built in cultural beliefs with our present?

This is not my usual read but it was well written, kept me interested and I love the author’s style of writing. Love the philosophical ending, it spoke to me

When we look back our life, we do not remember important events in chronological order. We somehow remember some striking or insignificant occasions, those we loved or just met, or words that moved or just went through our minds. But those things often bring impacts on our way of thinking, traits, and behavior.I found "offerings" very realistic story of recollections of a Korean-American hero.

A beautifully written book! A rare opportunity to see Korean-American life and a big project in finance industry. I imagine a very few people can write these kind of project in realistic words.