The Vegetarian

"Life is such a strange thing, she thinks, once she has stopped laughing. Even after certain things have happened to them, no matter how awful the experience, people still go on eating and drinking, going to the toilet, and washing themselves - living in other words. And sometimes, they even laugh out loud." The Vegetarian is about a woman's descent into psychosis from different points of view except her own, and for me, the entire book (and for what it's worth, life as well) is characterized by the above reflection from In-hye, her sister. For me, In-Hye's POV was the most relatable and likeable in this short read, despite being a flawed character. It was surprising how quickly I detested the other two POVs almost the moment they started because they lacked depth IMO, while hers felt like it was so multi-layered and well-written. For what it's worth, across POVs my feelings swung from rage to disgust to compassion. I don't know if it was an intentional effort on Han Kang's part to do this to differentiate the internal monologues among genders, but if it was - it was done very well. Being an Asian, I also genuinely appreciated the representation of familial hierarchy and dysfunctionality in the book that went beyond stereotypical quirks depicted in other popular media. It irks me when we, as a collective, generalize any stereotype to death (even if they are true) as though we're not all contained of multitudes. I attempted (and am still trying) to rationalise the entire spiral, while grappling with themes of trauma, abuse, etc depicted in the book because they're pretty graphic, and are bound to shock some, if not all readers. Which is why, I don't think I was entirely satisfied with the depiction of her slow descent and also feel like it would benefit from more perspectives (!). Summarizing it all, this definitely wasn't an easy read for me and I still am reeling from having completed this yesterday. But then, aren't those the best kinds of books?