well, i didn't rlly like that.

i loved Cho Nam-joo's Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 so imagine my disappointment when i finally finished this. where her first work was sharp and magnetic, this was a bit clueless where it wanted to go. i would've liked more exposition on how the citizens differed from one another because i only had a vague idea of the society. the worldbuilding felt flimsy and lacklustre, and i was not convinced with their issues. the characters were two-dimensional and the plot fell flat. the ending tied up all the plot points together, but the jumping around of the timeline confused me and i felt that its structure did not rlly work with the story.

overall, i did not like it. it would've been a 2 stars because i see what the author is trying to do, but i did not feel that she did that well and the last 30% of it was incredibly boring.

This didn’t work for me. I don’t know if it was the writing or the translation but the whole thing was dry. Felt like a slog to read.

Saha is a set of apartment blocks in a town that is Walled off from everywhere else in the name of the town is “town.“ I believe the town is owned by either a bunch of corporations or a bunch of investors and I know that seems like a half a dozen of one and six of the other but I can’t remember which they said. Either way there’s three Citizen types in “town“ its citizens who have all the rights of being born there they can do skilled labor and have good jobs, then there’s C- 2’s, they are temporary citizens in must reapply every two years to once again BSC too in their allowed to get the pretty okay jobs as well not as good as citizens but better than Saha‘s.and then we come to Saha's, they are considered to be the lowest of the low. OK it starts off with this couple parked outside of a park and the guy notices that the woman who he’s in love with is dead. This is when he takes off. Then we skip to the guy sister will call B She show’s up at the Apartment block and is watching the news with the grumpy janitor who she’s brought drinks to from a cleaning job she did when she sees that the citizen her brother was in love with his dad she knows she must find her brother. Now the book isn’t strictly about her in her search for her brother but is tentatively about that there’s also a side story of a midwife who couldn’t afford to go to nursing school but she’s so good and they’re so shorthanded that the head nurse allows her to do births on her own and of course that doesn’t end well for the midwife. They have other minor stories and I would love to tell you the overall conception of the book but I don’t know what it is. I will say this book was interesting and it held my attention I think the author has a vivid imagination and although a lot of the book mirrored a lot of social aspects happening today I can’t say I thoroughly enjoyed it because it took me a while to finish it I kept starting and stopping but I will say this is a book my husband and oldest daughter would love but they’re not doing the review item I’m sure because I think this that everyone will think this was a great book but I don’t want to lie and say it is and it’s not. It’s not a bad book but I just think it’s a book meant for someone else. I mean when the book started in the guy in the girl were in the car and she was dead and he ran off and I thought oh this looks like it’s going to be a good book but then it switched but it was his sister and and I thought after she got to the janitor that well at least she knows him the guy who ran off but it just went to many different places I’m just prolonging the end of this review it was an OK book I think if you like speculative fiction then you may love this book. I appreciated the fact I got to read it I received it from NetGalley and the publisher and I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictated most of this long review.gg

I had absolutely loved the author's other book Kim Ji-Young, Born 198 2so I had high expectations for this one. While the premise was intriguing, I wasn't crazy about the execution.

I loved KIM JI-YOUNG, BORN 1982 so I was perhaps overly excited when I acquired an eARC of Cho Nam-Joo's SAHA through NetGalley. Readers, you absolutely cannot go into SAHA thinking it will be anything like KIM JI-YOUNG, BORN 1982. They're nothing alike. SAHA is very dystopian and, honestly, really wasn't my cup of tea. The story/writing didn't engage me, but I don't think it was an issue with the translation; I think it's just not for me. Lots of interesting discussion points--especially that ending. It felt very PARASITE meets SQUID GAME.

Cho Nam-Joo’s sophomore novel, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, was one of the most innovative books I read in my role as a reader for the 2020 Aspen Words prize. I was thrilled to see that her debut novel Saha had subsequently been translated into English following the success of Kim Jiyoung. While this book does indeed feel like a debut, it’s also remarkably bold, unexpectedly thrilling, and strikingly thoughtful. Saha is a dystopian novel, set in a fictional fervently isolationist country called Town and named for the rundown apartment complex where those deemed too poor or undesirable to earn citizenship are forced to reside. Our protagonist is Jin-kyung whose brother Do-kyung is suspected of killing Su, the pediatrician who makes rounds visiting the children of Saha Estates. Jin-kyung is certain her brother is innocent of this particular crime, although she is also petrified at the possible revelation of a violent episode in their past that led them to Saha and Town. Intermixed with this urgent mystery are a series of vignettes that give us glimpses into the lives of the Saha residents and further reveal the corrupting force of unchecked capitalism in this dystopian world. While the novel sometimes falters for not committing to one genre, it’s a fascinating and original addition to the dystopian novel canon and a smart literary thriller to get your pulse pounding this fall.

Fall reading mood: you want to shake things up and read something off the beaten path

Read this if you like: The Resisters by Gish Jen, Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler, Parasite, Squid Game, experimental fiction, literary dystopias

I really wanted to get into this — the premise was intriguing — but after a promising first three pages I started to lose interest fast.

I’m not sure if it was the translation or the author’s true style, but either way the writing didn’t pull me in. A town literally owned by a corporation! I should’ve been invested! But I really wasn’t.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

Saha is a telling that we've seen a few times before, but this ends up leaving more questions than providing answers. I enjoyed how we jumped around in the timeline and from character to character to get a grasp as to how the Saha live. However, I really struggled with fully understanding the class divide when we don't see many in depth interactions between the citizens, L2s, and the Saha. There also was a huge tone shift that didn't feel fitting near the end of this read.

It was a fine read, but a bit too convoluted for my taste. There was definitely some interesting stuff in it, the social commentary was valuable and worth thinking about, but the plot itself fell flat for me. The translation was good, though, so I appreciate that.

I’ve heard so many great reviews on Cho Nam-Joo, but I’m afraid this story just fell flat. I tried to follow the plot line, but I struggled.

The formatting interferes with the flow of the story, often things are not capitalized appropriately or a capital letter will be mid word. The formatting for the names is not consistent either for example Jin-Kyung’s name will lose and regain it’s hyphen within the same sentence.
Middling flashbacks that don’t necessarily add to the characters or plot are frequent - there could definitely just be an element that is lost in translation.
Do-Kyung is not really a character I had sympathy for anyway, already having killed someone and frankly being a bit lazy and uninspired while his sister slaved away; She’s better off without his weight.
The formatting made the transition between characters unclear as well which just added confusion the timeline and developments.

I’ve heard a lot about this author and will search out her first novel to get a better impression of her work. Since I feel the translation and formatting may have had a lot to do with my displeasure I’m not going to post a review to blog as it wouldn’t necessarily be a fair reflection of the author’s efforts.


A big old “Thank You” to Netgalley, the Publisher and of course the author for the chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review. Your efforts are in good hands and I appreciate the trust.

Title: Saha
Author: Cho Nam-Joo
Publisher: Liveright
Pages: 240
Format: ePub (Will be sold in hardcover)
Publication Date: November 1, 2022

Cho Nam-Joo's Saha introduces readers to a dystopian like class society and the lives of those who survive in the harsher spaces outside of society. The main plot focuses on Jin-kyung and her brother who is the prime suspect in his girlfriend's murder. While trying to prove her brother's innocence Jin-kyung discovers a darker truth about their society and way of living.

There's a fairly long section of the book that discusses the logistics of the class system of Town where people are considered L, L2, or Citizen based on their skill, family, and financial status, but our main characters don't fall in to any of these categories. They are Saha, the outcasts, orphans, criminals, or just desperate people looking for an escape from their past life and a new start. While each of the characters' backstories are interesting and add to the overall themes of found family, trauma, and survival, the transitions between these characters and the main plot is a bit jarring and left me with more questions than answers.

It feels like this novel couldn't quite decide what it wanted to be about. The glimpses into the lives of the characters gave the work the most merit for me, but overall the work falls short as the main plot took too much of a back seat and I never felt like I got a full view of the oppressiveness or Orwellian nature of town since we spent so much time outside of it.

Thanks to the publisher for an e-galley of this book. While the summary looked fascinating, I was unable to read this. The file was distorted on my kindle as it was sent as a protected PDF as opposed to a kindle file. I hope to read this when it is published.

Saha comes across well in the translation — it is a wonderful blend of science fiction and literary work, and recommended for readers that enjoy well-written dystopian worlds.

Saha is the name of a housing project on the outskirts of Town, an island nation owned by a corporate entity and ruled by a shadowy governance board. Town is organized according to the haves (Ls), who are white-collar laborers who can participate in the high-profit sectors of Town like the bio-tech and IT industries, and have full-citizenship; and the have-nots (L2) who are blue-collar laborers that fill the remaining roles in this small economy and are only legally in Town via 2-year work visas, despite many of them predating the establishment of the Town nation-state. In Town, as in every country, there also exists members of the community who are not present "legally" - called "Sahas" for the name of the housing project where many of them live. This book follows some residents of the Saha Estates.

The premise of this book is brilliant, I mean just reading that synopsis I was like YES this is a dystopian novel about capitalist-governance and its very real consequences for average people. The book starts off strong, introducing us to some core characters but, more importantly, introducing us to Town, its structure, its genesis, etc. A corporate bio-tech government that takes power in a very simple but completely realistic way - haven't you read stories in the news about massive corporations moving into town, buying up all viable property, forcing the locals out, and greasing palms in local government until the company is the town? Thinking (from my American POV) of Virginian coal mines, United Fruit Company in Central America, pineapples in Hawaii. It's happened for centuries, it's happening now, and in this novel, Cho Nam-Joo simply takes those developments to their natural next step.

I hate when people flippantly compare any dystopian novel to 1984 and any feminist novel to Handmaid's Tale, so I won't do that... but I want to. This book nails the almost horror-like specter of the State leering, monitoring one's every move although you cannot quite know for certain when, where, or how, as well as the hopelessness of people surviving, and it culminates in a final confrontation of the established order, much like in Orwell's novels. Both authors warn of unchecked accumulation of power/wealth - Orwell warns of the dangerous ideology of "communism", and in Saha we see instead the future of the dangerous ideology of capitalism, and its current/ongoing unification with government.

All that being said, I felt disappointed by this novel. As you can see, I was very excited by the premise and set-up but the delivery fell short of the mark. Primarily I have two complaints: first, there were too many character vignettes; second, that she could've done so much more with this premise. Because the book doesn't do enough to serve as a critique of capitalism (or anything else), it ends up as just a nice story of impoverished people barred from society's upper echelons. My third, smaller critique, is that at times the translation felt very unnatural and choppy.

Although the beginning sets us up for an intriguing story of Town and the Sahas who get by despite everything, the meat of the book relies upon vignettes of characters at the Saha Estates and the combination of so many - at times unconnected - vignettes made the book feel disjointed. I also thought many of the characters' stories did not necessarily add anything new that had not been covered already. For instance, the need to include what, 3 or 4 pregnant women and their babies, felt extremely superfluous and I could hardly keep each of them straight. We get it, women are the crux of the family, women are the crux of the community, women take the brunt of bodily oppression... but there was so much more she could've done with this!

This brings me to my second complaint: I wanted more oomph. If you're going to say something about capitalism at a point in time where 75% of people under the age of 30 are ready to see it fall, SAY IT LOUDLY. Going back to the example in the paragraph above, with all the women having babies - in a state where profit is the only thing that matters, I mean your leaders are literally doing profit analysis on human life, right? What could be more natural than encouraging women - half the laborers - to get abortions (and therefore, to continue working)? The closer you get to a purely capitalist state, the more readily available abortions should be. This is not a feminist stance, as feminism would argue that people should not have to choose between an income and a child, but this IS a capitalist stance - people cannot labor for profit when/if they have children, and capitalism values humans only when they are laboring for profit. But this book didn't really say much about these women and their babies except: oh, how sad. Between her first book and this one, I can see that motherhood is an important topic for the author, but if you just wanted to discuss how poorly women and mothers are treated in poverty, you didn't need a dystopian setting for that.

My third complaint was about the translation, although it might have been the editor and not the translator, I can't be certain, but there were times when I would be reading, thinking "What is this sentence structure? What did she mean here?" because the purpose of the sentence did not come across clearly. There were also some things that definitely should have been changed by the translator and if not, then caught by the editor. For example, this sentence: "When Do-kyung seized Su's wrist in surprise, Su slowly free herself from Do-kyung's grasp". In a scene where they are the only two people and he is the only person to have seized her wrist, why include his name a second time as opposed to his pronoun? For that matter, why include her name twice - she is the only 'she' in this scene, "her wrist" and "his grasp" would flow much more smoothly. BUT I DIGRESS.

This was actually more of a 3 or 4-star read for me but I feel the need to offset some of the bad reviews I've seen on GR that seem to be primarily people who are disgruntled because they didn't "get" the book. I'm not saying that feedback isn't fair - in my opinion, a book shouldn't force you to search for its meaning or value, but I also didn't think the purpose/meaning of this story was that hard to find and I definitely don't think it's a bad book or deserving of less than 3 stars so... there you have my 5-star rating.

This is pretty solid for a lit-fic book. I enjoyed Cho's other works better. Maybe I'm just not the target audience for the book, but I still enjoyed it.

Saha is a pretty dystopian novels about a group of people living in the Saha Estates. I loved all the different characters and their stories. It gives me thriller vibes, very enjoyable to read!

Saha is a smart and heartful sophomore novel by Cho Nam-Joo, following a cast of characters who, considered outcasts by society in this dystopian world, live in a place called Saha Estates. Though the book is often confusing and hard to follow with several time jumps, it is also alive with a brilliant set of characters, stand outs to me being Woomi and Su. The prose is also stunning, in par with Cho's debut, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, which I also love.

The Saha Estates are an apartment complex on the edge of Town, an “independent” “nation” that is/is “owned by” (?) a corporation. Citizenship in Town is determined by ability, but only where it concerns what we call white-collar work. Caregivers, teachers, and people in other service-oriented professions must compete for 2-year contracts that permit them to live in Town. Those who cannot or will not participate in the scramble for contract work end up at Saha.

Cho’s narrative follows several Saha residents at various points in their lives, building an overall impression of the specific and numerous ways that “corporate governance”/a fully privatized public sphere dehumanizes everyone. There’s a plot—Saha resident Do-Kyung goes into hiding when his Citizen girlfriend, Su, dies in a car crash. Do-Kyung’s sister, Jin-Kyung, embarks on a quest to clear her brother’s name, which compels her to confront the structural forces that created and sustain life at Saha, and which leads and is connected to solving other “mysteries” related to Town.

It's a thriller that makes you think! Saha is being marketed as appealing to fans of "Squid Game," but I'll note it's not nearly as violent as "Squid Game" and that's a good thing, in my opinion.

This review is based on an ARC of Saha which I received courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher (W.W. Norton & Co./Liveright).

2.5 stars

Because I liked the writing, the pacing, and the general structure of this novel, I am going to offer major benefit of the doubt and say that confusion is on my part, not the author's. Maybe some essence was lost in translation. Maybe popular literature is different in Korea. Maybe I'm not in the right state of mind.

In any case, Saha reads like a series of disjointed vignettes. Each chapter stars a resident of the Saha Estate, their stories often interconnecting to--I assume--form a bigger picture. For me, there wasn't a connection. It's possible that I wasn't invested enough in the characters to care, or delve into their relations.

Again, Saha is blooming with fine literary merits, I just don't think it's the story for me.