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If I Had Your Face

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If I Had Your Face

By: Frances Cha
Narrated by: Frances Cha, Sue Jean Kim, Ruthie Ann Miles, Jeena Yi
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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

'Gripping' Curtis Sittenfeld * 'Electrifying' Taylor Jenkins Reid * 'Remarkable' Kevin Kwan * 'Stunning' Sunday Times * 'Brilliant' Pandora Sykes

In South Korea, where impossible beauty standards and ruthless social hierarchies dictate your every move, four women are balancing on a razor's edge:

Kyuri, a beautiful 'room salon' girl paid to entertain wealthy businessmen after hours.
Miho, an artist whose life becomes enmeshed with the offspring of the super-wealthy elite.
Ara, a hairstylist whose obsession with a K-pop star leads her to violent extremes.
Wonna, their neighbour, pregnant with a child that she can't afford.

Set in the drinking dens and beauty salons of Seoul, If I Had Your Face is an electrifying debut novel about female strength, resilience and the solace that friendship can provide.

'Cha's writing always crackles . . . Touching, compelling and icily cool' Observer

'Fascinating, eye-opening, compelling - like the film Parasite, If I Had Your Face is also an exposé of the class system in South Korea' Independent

'Absolutely stunning. . . Assured, bold, and electrifying' Taylor Jenkins Reid, Sunday Times bestselling author of DAISY JONES & THE SIX

'One of the buzziest debuts of the year, If I Had Your Face transports readers to glittering, futuristic Seoul... Essential reading' Vogue

'Culturally fascinating, emotionally layered, gripping and smart' Curtis Sittenfeld, bestselling author of PREP and AMERICAN WIFE

'Glittering, engrossing' Helen Oyeyemi, author of GINGERBREAD

'Remarkable, brilliantly crafted and devastatingly exquisite' Kevin Kwan, bestselling author of CRAZY RICH ASIANS

LONGLISTED FOR THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE 2021

© Frances Cha 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

 City Life Coming of Age Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Urban Women's Fiction Fiction Marriage

Critic Reviews

Absolutely stunning . . . Assured, bold, and electrifying, If I Had Your Face marks the entrance of a bright new voice in fiction (Taylor Jenkins Reid, New York Times bestselling author of DAISY JONES & THE SIX)
Each voice in this quartet cuts through the pages so cleanly and clearly that the overall effect is one of dangerously glittering harmony. The tale told here is as engrossing as a war chant, or a mosaic formed with blades, every piece a memento sharpened on those unyielding barriers between us and our ideal lives. (Helen Oyeyemi, award-winning author of GINGERBREAD)
If I Had Your Face is hilarious, cuttingly observant, feminist, and all-around delightful. It is hard to write a book about four protagonists and make you care for all of them-yet somehow Cha succeeds. (Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, Costa-shortlisted author of 'Starling Days')
Troubling, kaleidoscopic, and hugely enjoyable (Nell Zink, author of THE WALLCREEPER, NICOTINE and MISLAID)
It's difficult to believe this is Frances Cha's first novel-she's a masterful storyteller. I couldn't put IF I HAD YOUR FACE down; I was riveted by the stories of four young women navigating life in the extreme, competitive environment of modern Seoul. I loved reading about a world I knew nothing about, and from the first page, it was clear Cha was the best possible guide. I highly recommend this novel. (Ann Napolitano, author of DEAR EDWARD)
Wonderful... unsettling and deeply affecting - the writing is beautifully spare, and captures with such clarity what it means for these four young women to be taught to hope for everything and yet continuously to receive nothing (Rosie Price, author of WHAT RED WAS)
Compelling, understated, casually brutal, and very cynical. I love it. (Hanna Jameson, bestselling author of 'The Last')
If I Had Your Face is a vivid, eviscerating depiction of social realism in contemporary Seoul. Frances Cha renders gender and class struggles with forensic detail, in a luminous voice both knowledgeable and compelling. (Sharlene Teo, author of 'Ponti')
I love the way Frances Cha rotates between mindsets to look at how beauty and privilege influence the way women live, whilst maintaining a sly lightness (Rebecca Watson, author of 'little scratch')
Make way for Frances Cha, an entrancing new voice who guides us into the complexities and contradictions of modern-day Seoul... I devoured it in a single sitting, and so will you. (Janice Lee, NYT Bestselling Author of THE PIANO TEACHER)
All stars
Most relevant
... however, it was much, much better. This was a slice of life/culture read I had very little knowledge about. As an avid armchair traveller my entire life, this is the sort of detail I always wish to glean from a destination. it was also the sort of information I expected from history lessons and instead frustratingly found history to be an endless, tedious catalogue of war, and war and wars and battles, and wars. As a contemporary spotlight on modern South Korea and (to a 'Westerner's' way of thinking) the deplorable state of affairs for many of South Korea's women, this was a most revealing insight. Four characters beautifully interwoven and skilfully narrated. Another reviewer states that "nothing much happens." This is both true and false. If you are looking for a highly familiar trope and story arch with a dramatic climax, or reveal, or bringing together of the four lives, you are not going to get that. This is more descriptive and flowing yet comfortably familiar. I found it engaged me from the very first chapter. There is satisfying development within the lookback scenes, which take the key moments from the girls'/womens' lives to flesh out their current situation and motivations. It did leave me wanting much more. I was bereft at having to leave the girls and their world, which is praise for the book, not criticism. All in all a very enjoyable and highly recommendable read.

Not at all what I was expecting ...

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The chapters provide vivid insight into each character’s inner world. Highly engaging and a story of female friendships and bravery in the core.

Vivid and engaging

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An interesting look into Korean culture but I couldn't say anything of note that actually happened.

It was Ok

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This story will stay with me for a while and I can’t wait to read Frances’ next offering. It’s a stunning debut.

I winced in parts. in others I was laughing and there were tears.

I enjoy Korean cinema and this is my first taste of their literature. Frances’ writing is gracefully sensual - I felt I was there at the party in New York with Miho, at Ara’s parents lowly bunker taking in the bereft decor, shoulder to shoulder with Kyuri at the salon with the groping disgusting customers.

After reading this story I now understand the harshness of life for Korean women who bear the double weight of Korean cultural pressures and the burden of patriarchy manifested in the unrealistic beauty standards they feel they must live up to and sometimes die for.

I’m still of two minds about surgery and cosmetic procedures but at least as an Australian woman I have a choice whereas it seems to me before and after reading this book that the young women of Korea do not.

Beautifully read and performed.

Excellent writing and characterisation

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fascinating & devastating glimpse into contemporary korean society, in a brilliantly deadpan tone. finished in 2 sessions, i was hooked.

loved it!

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