This was such a beautiful and poignant novel, and I think it's one of my new favorites. This story follows four generations of a family, starting in the early 1900s. Sunja is born to two hard-working parents, Yangjin and Hoonie in Korea, and she is raised to be a humble and helpful woman. The path of her life changes forever when she meets Koh Hansu, and she becomes pregnant. Fortunately, Sunja can marry Isak, a pastor, and they begin a new life in Japan where this four generational story blooms.

The historical part of this novel was honestly so great for me because I think I definitely learned a great bit about the Korean/Japanese relationship. The author did an excellent job in bringing together the different cultures to form a story that felt very tangible. There were struggles, but you could also see changes as the timeline progressed. The mixed culture elements also helped to shape the characters, especially in the stories of the grandsons/great-grandsons. I don't think the novel was entirely character-driven, and it balanced the evolving plot and different character storylines well.

This novel was quite long, as there were a lot of events and time to cover. I found that I did like the earlier stories in the timeline better. The writing was wonderful all the way through, and I still think that the nearly 500 pages of this book are worth reading, but it does start to lose some pizazz (?) towards the end. The ending especially, with Solomon's storyline left me a little confused and unsatisfied. Also, because pachinko was supposed to be the overarching theme, Soloman's story turned out the way it did, but also, pachinko really wasn't introduced as part of the book until 3/5 the way through this book. It did unify the brothers/members of the younger generations in a sense, and I found it interesting to compare and contrast the brothers, so it was useful but also just kind of there. I'm guessing that pachinko is a metaphor for having small amounts of luck in life, but most of it is suffering/having to try again repeatedly.

Speaking of unifying, I think the author does a good job of connecting the multiple storylines throughout the novel. It could have been easy to get lost, but she involves different characters and instances/events to really bring the whole novel together. One of the bigger themes that I saw was identity/a loss or confusion of who the characters wanted to be. Noa is a clear example of this, as well as Yumi. This meshed so well into the storyline as the plot developed further. Now there was the question of trying to stay connected to their Korean roots, being ashamed of these, and wanting to be Japanese or just becoming American instead. Also - on the topic of characters, I loved how there was so much contrast between different characters to deepen the story/themes, such as the contrast between Yumi and Akiko, Isak and Koh Hansu, Solomon and Noa, etc.

I did mention that this novel was quite poignant, and it truly was. It really broke my heart several times when I was reading this. There were bright moments, but I think what made it so touching and communicated the themes so well was that it was filled with such sad moments whenever you weren't expecting it. There would be a tragic moment, and then in the novel, life would continue on, and then you would turn a corner, and there would be a totally heart-breaking moment that twisted the mood all over again. These downer moments were plenty throughout the novel, and they were really well written. I think they kind of became a lot at the end of the book, as there seemed to be so much stuff that was being fit in at the end, but it was still sad to read.

I also loved the ending of this book so much. It was such a beautiful, beautiful, story on families, culture, identity, love, and ultimately loss. The writing was so well done, and it is definitely worth a read.