Keanu Reeve’s John Wick meets Korean Culture. Winner, LTI Korea Translation Prize, Korea, Democratic People’s Republic of, 2019

Un-su Kim weaves a tale of assassins and conspiracy that’s full of sticky moral conundrums. Abandoned as a baby and raised to be a hit man in the South Korean underworld, taciturn book lover Reseng can’t quite quit the only life he’s known. And like the book’s titular plotters—shadowy figures who order hits for a variety of reasons—Reseng and his ilk are bound together by intricate criminal codes.

The faceless plotters of the title employ hit men such as Reseng, an orphan found in a garbage can who was adopted by a man called Old Raccoon. The bookish Reseng grows up in Old Raccoon’s library a place “crawling with assassins, hired guns and bounty hunters.” In the first chapter, Reseng kills a retired general from the days of South Korea’s military junta after spending a sociable evening at the old man’s house. The complex plot, in which Reseng becomes involved with a more polished, CEO-like hit man named Hanja, builds to a highly cinematic and violent denouement. Most memorable, though, is the novel’s message about the insidiousness of unaccountable institutions, from those under the military junta to those that thrive in today’s economy. The consequence of the pervasive corruption is an air of existential despair. This strange, ambitious book will appeal equally to literary fiction readers.

What I loved about the book: the stories people told. The whale hunt. The orphan who liked to read in secret. The Factory worker who wanted just to work and save up for a house. The two sisters and the cross-eyed obsessive knitter. The prostitute’s tale of death by cyanide or barbiturates. The different death modes. The Bear. The Barber and his daughter. The two cats Reading Lamp and Book Stand and the story of the woman who took care of them.

What I didn’t enjoy as much: Not sure if it was the audiobook narrator or the story itself but all the characters were so lifeless. I know it’s describing an antihero but at least put some excitement in there!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Un-su Kim was born in 1972 in Busan and is the author of several highly praised novels. He has won the Munhakdongne Novel Prize, Korea’s most prestigious literary prize, and was nominated for the 2016 Grand Prix de la Littéraire Policière. He lives in Jinhae-gu, South Korea.