"I Guess I Live Here Now" by Claire Ahn

I Guess I Live Here Now (May 24, 2022) by Claire Ahn.

<This is a standalone novel.>

After a minor transgression (in her eyes), Melody Solmi Lee is stunned to hear that she and her mom are leaving New York City to join her dad in Seoul, like, right now! She barely has time to say goodbye to Sophia Taye, her best friend, before she’s flying First Class (how?). Melody is resentful and homesick. But she soon finds herself trying to settle into her family’s luxurious apartment, while being set up on blind dates, gaining rich friends at her fancy international school, struggling through AP courses when she’s not entirely fluent in Korean herself (Honors Korean, for real?), and comparing Seoul to NYC and constantly finding it wanting. It takes a new friend calling her out on her judgmental attitude to really begin seeing that she isn’t being fair to her new home and some of the people around her. Thanks to her new friends, her eyes are opened to amazing food, trendsetting fashion and design that she loves but was unfamiliar with (hanoks). It doesn’t hurt that her dad has a black card and a personal driver, and there’s a cute boy named Wonjae in her new friend group. There are cracks, too, in the strained relationship that her dad has with his parents and in his treatment of her (to Koreans, strictness is the norm, but not so for one who grew up in America) and in the secrets her mom’s been keeping from her. Melody has a plan to return to NYC. All she needs to do is make the final round for a prestigious design internship and then have the best interview to be the overall choice. Oh, and she has to come out of all of her ultra difficult midterms with straight-As. That’s it. Ha.

            Reading this YA novel, in which a fully Americanized teenager is sent “home” to Korea, is fresh and fun. Melody (also called Solmi, which is her Korean name) is 16 years old, so there are believable teenager vibes, but readers also watch Melody’s journey of self-discovery and her up-and-down emotions, like in the doldrums of uprooting all you’ve known and the ups of young love. This story basks in the glow of Seoul’s neon lights and dazzles every bit as much as the hottest artists and actors in K-pop and K-dramas. While Melody’s umbrage is understandable, it doesn’t mean that I always liked her character, but with a steady plot, family drama, the discomfort of moving forward in a new place and the adventure of misadventures, it kept my interest overall. It’s entertaining and the Seoul backdrop is well-done. The transcultural themes are important, and I now want to go eat too much Korean food!