'The Kinship of Secrets' is a Novel of War, Migration and Separation

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Eugenia Kim

All too often, entire families are torn apart by war, and the repercussions of their pain and separation last for generations. The Korean War ended with an armistice in 1953, but no peace treaty was ever signed, leaving the world with a modern reminder of the Cold War and forcing hundreds of unwillingly families to remain divided to this day. A new novel by Eugenia Kim brings readers a timely and poignant tale of one family’s struggle to maintain familial ties in the face of war, migration and separation.

Imagine if the majority of your family traveled abroad in peacetime, only to have war break out at home while you are away, leaving you no safe way to return. Now, imagine that you had left one of your children behind in that war-torn country. This is the story at the heart of Kim’s novel, The Kinship of Secrets, a sweeping chronicle of a single family’s separation before, during and after the Korean War. It is a moving story of two sisters—one growing up in suburban America while the other struggles to survive without parents in a suddenly divided Korean peninsula—as well as a haunting story of the parents, whose guilt and sacrifice follow them as they struggle to build a new life in a foreign land.

Kim is the author of The Calligrapher’s Daughter, which was identified as a best historical novel by The Washington Post. Kim is the daughter of Korean immigrants who came to America on the cusp of the Korean War, resulting in their own family separations. She will discuss The Kinship of Secrets with UW-Milwaukee professor Nan Kim at Boswell Book Co. at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 13.