![Joseph Han - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B09G3BC4Z3.jpg)
Nuclear Family
Shortlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Prize
Longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
A TIME Best Book of the Year
Set in the months leading up to the 2018 nuclear missile false alarm, a Korean American family living in Hawai'i faces the fallout of their eldest son's attempt to run across the Demilitarized Zone into North Korea in this "fresh, inventive, and at times, hilarious novel" (Kaui Hart Hemmings, author of The Descendants)
Things are looking up for Mr. and Mrs. Cho. Their dream of franchising their Korean plate lunch restaurants across Hawaiʻi seems within reach after a visit from Guy Fieri boosts the profile of Cho's Delicatessen. Their daughter, Grace, is busy finishing her senior year of college and working for her parents, while her older brother, Jacob, just moved to Seoul to teach English. But when a viral video shows Jacob trying--and failing--to cross the Korean demilitarized zone, nothing can protect the family from suspicion and the restaurant from waning sales.
No one knows that Jacob has been possessed by the ghost of his lost grandfather, who feverishly wishes to cross the divide and find the family he left behind in the north. As Jacob is detained by the South Korean government, Mr. and Mrs. Cho fear their son won't ever be able to return home, and Grace gets more and more stoned as she negotiates her family's undoing. Struggling with what they don't know about themselves and one another, the Chos must confront the separations that have endured in their family for decades.
Set in the months leading up to the 2018 false missile alert in Hawaiʻi, Joseph Han's profoundly funny and strikingly beautiful debut novel is an offering that aches with histories inherited and reunions missed, asking how we heal in the face of what we forget and who we remember.
Editorial Reviews
Shortlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Prize
Longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, TIME, Debutiful, and them
Named a Most Anticipated Book by BuzzFeed, LGBTQ Reads, The Millions, Goodreads, and more
"You'd have to visit Cirque du Soleil to see someone juggle as much as Han with such effortless dexterity and tenderness . . . Rhythmic and hypnotic; it captivates from the very first page and gracefully conveys the loss and the longing the family experiences." -The New York Times Book Review
"This book is genius . . . The narrative is inventive, and the prose is too: upside-down sentences, scrambled language, erased words. None of this is distracting; it only enhances the reading experience. Oh, and the book is funny. No. Hilarious. Nuclear Family woke me up from the deep slumber of Covid and brought me back to life. I'm sure it will do the same for every reader." -Morgan Talty, The Wall Street Journal
"Joseph Han's heartfelt and hilarious novel is so well executed, so self-assured, that it's hard to believe it's a debut . . . Guy Fieri, who makes a cameo in the novel, might call this book 'off the chain'; we'll just settle for 'masterful.'" -Michael Schaub, A NPR Best Book of the Year
"[A] gorgeous debut." -TIME
"Inventive." -A Washington Post Book to Read This Summer
"An inventive debut . . . In Nuclear Family, through laughter and wonder and intriguing complexity, Han makes us pay attention." -Bethanne Patrick, Los Angeles Times
"The unalloyed genius of Nuclear F...
