‘Atmospheric, exquisitely written and highly charged.’
Olivia Sudjic, author of Sympathy
‘A vivid, tactile, often claustrophobic, and gorgeously written novel. An absolute joy from beginning to end.’
Lara Williams, author of Supper Club
‘Narrated in an elegant, enigmatic voice that skilfully summons the tenderness and mutability of an inner life, Winter in Sokcho is a lyrical and atmospheric work of art.’
Sharlene Teo, author of Ponti
‘Beautifully translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins, comes together slowly, like a Polaroid photo, its effects both intimate and foreign.’
Yoojin Grace Wuertz, TLS
‘Dusapin’s terse sentences are at times staggeringly beautiful, their immediacy sharply and precisely rendered from French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins … Oiled with a brooding tension that never dissipates or resolves, Winter in Sokcho is a noirish cold sweat of a book.’
Catherine Taylor, Guardian
‘A punchy first novel.’
The Guardian, ‘Top 10 Best New Books in Translation’
‘The bustling seaside resort of Sokcho in South Korea is the perfect backdrop for this quietly haunting debut … [A] graceful, slow drift of a novel.’
Eithne Farry, Daily Mail
‘[Winter in Sokcho is] a beautifully judged work … [it]offers a fascinating glimpse into a little-known part of South Korea, far from the bright lights of Seoul, where the wounds of a war fought last century are still weeping.’
Christine Kearney, The Canberra Times
‘A masterful short novel.’
Ellen Peirson-Hagger, New Statesman
‘Elisa Shua Dusapin’s first-person narrative is formed of crystalline sentences that favour lucid imagery to describe themes of loneliness, familial obligation, identity, societal pressures and sexuality.’
ArtReview Asia
‘A tender and poetic first novel.’
Le Monde
‘Winter In Sokcho has an atmosphere, as much emotional as it is physical, that envelops the reader.’
Le Temps
‘What strikes you the most when you read Elisa Shua Dusapin's novel is her ability to create a rich sensory and emotional world from profoundly sparse writing … [R]emarkable in its formal daring and maturity.’
Lire
‘Crisp and poetic.’
Susie Mesure, i
‘Dazzling.’
Vogue, ‘Top Five Debuts’
‘I haven’t encountered a voice like this since Duras — spellbinding.’
ELLE
‘A masterpiece.’
Huffington Post
‘[A] haunting portrait of an out-of-season tourist town on the border between North and South Korea … The story that unfolds is chilling.’
Monocle
‘Dusapin’s luminous debut follows a young French Korean woman as she wrestles with desire, daughterhood, and identity … Dusapin’s precise sentences, expertly translated by Higgins, elicit cinematic images and strong emotions. This poignant, fully realised debut shouldn’t be missed.’
Publishers Weekly, starred review
‘A pleasure to read. The descriptions of daily life in the titular town are beautiful, elliptical, and fascinating, from the fish markets near the beach to soju-drenched dinners in local bistros to a surreal glimpse of a museum on the DMZ … A triumph.’
Kirkus Reviews, starred review
‘In Sokcho, everyone is in a holding pattern. The country waits for the war with the North to reignite. The town waits for warm weather and the tourist season. Kerrand waits for just the right spark of inspiration. And the narrator waits for she knows not what: perfection, happiness, freedom … or maybe just simple acknowledgement. Winter in Sokcho is a spare novel about existence in the between spaces of identity and passion.’
Eileen Gonzalez, Foreword Reviews
‘This irresistible and spare novel sketches with exquisite depth a season of searching for both a French Korean woman and a French visitor … the brevity and pacing of its vignettes are also reminiscent of comics … Dusapin's beguiling work resembles a vibrant graphic novel, sans pictures … This irresistible and spare novel sketches with exquisite depth a season of searching for both a French Korean woman and a French visitor.’
Dave Wheeler, Shelf Awareness
Winter in Sokcho is deftly translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins. Imbued with a strange sense of abandonment, the spare language contrasts with the world of light and shadows that it conveys. If you are looking for translated fiction to lose yourself in, the kind of book that will thoroughly engage and transport you to another world, then read and relish Winter in Sokcho.
BookBlast
‘Unassuming yet richly rewarding, Winter in Sokcho is the debut novel from Elisa Shua Dusapin. the young French writer's work is so beautifully adorned with atmospherics, that the sights, smells, sounds, and storms are quite nearly palpable. A wistfulness hangs like a low fog, enveloping Dusapin's story in a melancholia that, at once, invites and obscures. Winter in Sokcho elicits a certain moodiness or anticipatory longing, reminiscent of the feeling one might have had after watching Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation for the first time. Like one of Kerrand's sketches, so much exists in the spaces between the inky contours.’
Jeremy Garber, Powell's Books
‘In a novel about mixed identity and misunderstanding, what I loved most was how delicately missed opportunities were handled. Spare and elegantly written, this book gave me goosebumps.’
Kaitlyn Arterburn, Literati Bookstore
‘This novel is not a long read but it is fulfilling. Elisa Shua Dusapin, French Korean herself, writes beautifully, and the translation by Aneesa Abbas Higgins is very well done … Winter in Sokcho is an assured debut from a talented young author that I would be keen to read more from.’
Theresa Smith Writes
‘Winter in Sokcho is an excellent book.’
Tony’s Reading List
‘This quietly spoken little book is quite remarkable … minimalist yet full of poignant, expressive moments captured succinctly and in an unassuming manner … It is exquisite reading and perfectly translated … Perfect. Memorable. The best read in many years.’
Reading, Writing and Riesling
‘A spellbinding debut novel, Winter in Sokcho is about intimacy and alienation in a remarkable setting.’
i-D Magazine, ‘Best Books of 2020’
‘[W[hen you experience the powerful and sophisticated voice of Dusapin through her compassionately rendered characters, it’s easy to see why this debut has caused a sensation … [her] style elevates a banal, claustrophobic experience and imbues it with hope and a sense of self-discovery. Winter in Sokcho washes over you like a dream.’
Dan Shaw, Happy Mag
‘A fascinating portrait of life in modern Korea.’
S Magazine
‘Winter in Sokcho is a tale heavy with tension and melancholy … A poignant coming of age story.’
The Hourglass
‘It is Dusapin’s controlled language that creates the sensory magic of the novel … The greater concerns of the novel — unrequited love, familial strain, self-discovery — are contextualised through Dusapin’s subtle descriptions of the light in Sokcho, the characterisation of a face, the mother’s damp bedsheets … through Dusapin’s artful language, the city is rendered as an intensely personal place, constructed by small, sensual acts: the taste of a fish before it is swallowed, the wave of ink as it pours across a cartoonist’s work, the rising and falling of a mother’s chest as she sleeps next to her daughter.’
Cecilia Barron, BOMB
‘I loved this. A beautiful, dreamlike story encompassing themes of detachment, fleeting connections and the pressure to conform to society’s expectations … This novella is beautifully-written, characterised by Dusapin’s clipped, crystalline prose. The desolate South Korean landscape is skilfully evoked, the stark imagery reflecting feelings of division and alienation … a haunting yet captivating novella of great tenderness and beauty. Very highly recommended indeed.’
JacquiWine's Journal
‘Elisa Shua Dusapin’s debut book … took me a mere three hours to read, but its after effects will stay with me for a lifetime … The language is so simple and comforting, nuanced yet made of sentences short and succinct, that one might mistake the author’s narrative to be too simple. It is by rupturing this simplicity with a complex story that keeps you engaged and is viscerally charged, that the author’s literary brilliance comes to fore … Told in a subtle and delicate way, Elisa Shua Dusapin’s Winter In Sokcho is a masterpiece that is thoroughly captivating and leaves you breathless.’
Nidhi Verma, Platform
‘Winter in Sokcho is a masterfully crafted tale of identity, alienation and longing, set against the backdrop of a town that, too, seeks reconciliation … Dusapin meticulously forms the identity of her narrator piece by piece, ensuring that no female body is seen whole whilst the narrator still lacks a distinct sense of self … Every word that Dusapin writes is alive with the act of conception. Atmospheric, subtle and utterly entrancing, this is a novel which asks us not only who we are, but how we come to be.’
Beatrice Tridimas, Review 31
‘[Dusapin's] intimate style suits the times with its light touch and feel for the particular.’
Rhonda Dredge, CBD News
‘Dusapin is an eloquent writer who has crafted a seemingly authentic depiction of Sokcho through her rich descriptions of food, people and working conditions at the seaport.’
Akina Hansen, Good Reading, starred review
‘A sober and visceral novel that explores the fault lines of identity— cultural, intimate and national. Aneesa Abbas Higgins’ elegant translation sublimates the language of Elisa Shua Dusapin.’
Judges’ comments from the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature
