Oxford Soju Club - by Jinwoo Park (Paperback)

About the Book

The natural enemy of a Korean is another Korean. When North Korean spymaster Doha Kim is mysteriously killed in Oxford, his protâegâe, Yohan Kim, chases the only breadcrumb given to him in Doha's last breath: "Soju Club, Dr. Ryu." In the meantime, a Korean American CIA agent, Yunah Choi, races to salvage her investigation of the North Korean spy cell in the aftermath of the assassination. At the centre of it all is the Soju Club, the only Korean restaurant in Oxford, owned by Jihoon Lim, an immigrant from Seoul in search of a new life after suffering a tragedy. As different factions move in with their own agendas, their fates become entangled, resulting in a bitter struggle that will determine whose truth will triumph. Oxford Soju Club weaves a tale of how immigrants in the Korean diaspora are forced to create identities to survive, and how in the end, they must shed those masks and seek their true selves.

Book Synopsis

The natural enemy of a Korean is another Korean.

When North Korean spymaster Doha Kim is mysteriously killed in Oxford, his protégé, Yohan Kim, chases the only breadcrumb given to him in Doha's last breath: "Soju Club, Dr. Ryu." In the meantime, a Korean American CIA agent, Yunah Choi, races to salvage her investigation of the North Korean spy cell in the aftermath of the assassination. At the centre of it all is the Soju Club, the only Korean restaurant in Oxford, owned by Jihoon Lim, an immigrant from Seoul in search of a new life after suffering a tragedy. As different factions move in with their own agendas, their fates become entangled, resulting in a bitter struggle that will determine whose truth will triumph.

Oxford Soju Club weaves a tale of how immigrants in the Korean diaspora are forced to create identities to survive, and how in the end, they must shed those masks and seek their true selves.

Review Quotes

Oxford Soju Club glitters with ferocious intelligence and propulsive action, as it is both a fast-paced spy-thriller and disarming exploration of the Korean diaspora. With bold confidence, Park offers readers a fresh and cerebral perspective that explores the existential and physical unmooring of three very disparate characters. Asian diasporic literature is often reduced to stereotypes, tropes, and trauma, but Park skillfully reinvents the genre, with his masterful storytelling and meticulous prose. The novel's themes are certainly dark, but this is a highly original and page-turning tale that grapples with the thornier aspects of identity, loyalty, duty, patriotism, and survival in perilous times.

Oxford Soju Club ingeniously transposes the code-switching and shapeshifting that diasporic Asians experience in the English-speaking world into a twisty, tension-filled spy story. A writer of great promise, Jinwoo Park navigates issues of identity as effortlessly as he transcends genre.

Oxford Soju Club is a gripping spy thriller that, at its core, tackles fundamental questions of identity and our place in the world. Park writes with stark honesty, deftly unraveling the inner turmoil of those caught between duty and self. A wonderful debut.

Oxford Soju Club is an astute examination of identity, diaspora, and longing cleverly masquerading as a spy thriller. Against the backdrop of political intrigue and covert espionage, Jinwoo Park peels back the layers on the many masks immigrants and those with multiple identities must contend with to form a kaleidoscopic picture of what it means to be Korean in today's modern world.

Oxford Soju Club is an intelligent, riveting, and poignant exploration, asking 'what makes you who you are?' and 'do you determine your own identity?' It's a novel full of yearning, like the eponymous drink - but also, ultimately, of hope.

Oxford Soju Club is full of twists and turns, including a surprising and touching ending, which I won't spoil here. As a unique confluence of genres, Park's novel will appeal to those interested in both spy stories and narratives about immigration and identity.

Oxford Soju Club kicks the doors open for other Korean diaspora writers while raising the bar for genre-bending fiction that is as thrilling as it is thought-provoking. The spycraft keeps the pages turning, but it is the richly crafted characters who will stay with you long after the final chapter. This is a haunting, intelligent, and resonant read.

The novel holds the humanity of each character at its core, moving toward a place where their shared blood is recognized and embraced despite the political undercurrents at play. A nuanced thriller, Oxford Soju Club is about the acceptance of people's deeper identities beyond social pretenses.

A captivating debut novel full of sparkling dialogue, unforgettable intrigue, and a truly fascinating premise. This story is riveting from the opening scene up to the final pages and Jinwoo Park's writing is as complex as his characters' motives. It is a novel that unpacks the uniqueness but also diversity of Korean diasporic experiences.

A fascinating, genre-shifting debut shaped as much by the twists and turns of espionage as by the pull of diasporic longing. I read Oxford Soju Club in one sitting, gripped by Jinwoo Park's ingenious evoking of a world I didn't want to leave.

A subtle and quiet portrayal of the intersubjectivity of diasporic life told through the form of a spy thriller. Espionage is used to put forward the anxieties of living in the in-between space of needing to be accepted in new cultural contexts and of feeling like the place you once thought was home no longer needs you. At once thrilling and complex, Jinwoo Park's Oxford Soju Club gives narrative to life experiences that leave echoes in our bodies but feel too convoluted to articulate clearly. In this small bar in Oxford, where the lives of spies, CIA agents, and immigrants cross, the histories and feelings of these diasporic bodies are given voice.

A tangled trident of three intense storylines, Oxford Soju Club is more than a spy thriller. Exploring the limits of nationality, loyalty and race, Jinwoo Park's debut invites important conversations surrounding Korean diasporic identity and belonging in a modern geopolitical world obsessed with national security.

As much an exploration of the Korean diaspora in the West as it is a spy novel, the novel emphasizes self-therapy, self-realization, and the pursuit of the eventual removal of one's masks. The novel holds the humanity of each character at its core, moving toward a place where their shared blood is recognized and embraced despite the political undercurrents at play. A nuanced thriller, Oxford Soju Club is about the acceptance of people's deeper identities beyond social pretenses.

Canadian Korean Jinwoo Park's debut novel, Oxford Soju Club, is an extraordinarily multilayered examination of identity and loyalty, deftly presented as an addicting spy thriller.

Fast-moving and dexterous, Oxford Soju Club is an innovative espionage story that exposes the boundaries of assimilation, diaspora, and loyalty, and what we do to survive.

In stylistically rich prose, the author carefully portrays complex characters, distilling the intricate workings of the Korean psyche with riveting tension. Under the cover of a compelling espionage drama, Park conducts a metaphorical exploration of Korean identity.

Jinwoo Park's Oxford Soju Club takes you over like music, immediate and eventually obsessive, the sort of book you cheat on your work with, the one you slip away to read. Sentence for sentence the prose is a fine thread winding through this game of spies, and eventually you realize the thread also winds through you. And this is because Park is not just a master but an enchanter.

Jinwoo Park's debut is sharp, and evocative, conjuring Oxford's moody cobblestones and shadowed alleyways with cinematic clarity. The pacing is expertly calibrated, balancing kinetic action with contemplative depth. His reimagining of the spy novel favours psychological tension over bombast, more Le Carré than Bond, yet distinctly infused with the emotional gravity of diaspora narratives. It recalls the introspective weight of The Sympathizer and the emotional resonance of Celeste Ng's Everything I Never Told You. Oxford Soju Club marks Jinwoo Park as a literary voice to watch. This kicks the doors open for other Korean diasporic writers while raising the bar for genre-bending fiction that is as thrilling as it is thought-provoking. The spycraft will make you quickly turn the pages, but the richly crafted characters will linger well after the final page - a haunting, intelligent, and resonant read.

Jinwoo Park's deftly crafted spy novel of desperate allegiances has the weight of national as well as personal tragedy. Northerner, Southerner, Westerner, spy - conflicting identities cast long shadows into history in each character's struggle to survive. What a great read.

On top of crafting a clever spy thriller, Park uses its vernacular of shifting alliances, donned masks, and the training one undergoes to assimilate to deftly probe questions of diasporic identity and how we decide where we belong.

Park, a Korean Canadian writer and translator, deftly maps the shifting terrain of characters whose identities are in flux and who are haunted by pasts from which they cannot escape. His novel mixes spycraft with tenderness, violence with grace, and introduces a welcome new spy fiction talent.

Spare in style but elaborate in design, Oxford Soju Club is both a classic tale of spy versus spy and a deep meditation on Korean immigrant identity. Through an intricate cast of characters, this penetrating debut novel asks how each of us might shed our assigned aliases and throw ourselves into 'the waves of life.' Jinwoo Park is a writer to watch.

Wildly inventive, fast-paced, and glowing with heart, Oxford Soju Club is an unforgettable debut. A spy thriller interlacing the paths of three individuals embroiled in what threatens to become an international incident, with a breakneck plot and a poignant way of describing trying to exist between worlds and to carve a place of your own in between.

With a web of cunning characters and their murky pasts, one never knows who to trust in Oxford Soju Club. Jinwoo Park's clever debut offers a fresh and propulsive examination of Korean identity.

About the Author

Jinwoo Park is a Korean Canadian writer based in Montreal. He completed a master's in creative writing at the University of Oxford. In 2021, he won the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award. He is also a literary translator and received the LTI Korea Translation Award for Aspiring Translators in 2023. Oxford Soju Club is his debut novel.