Ten Thousand Sorrows: 4/5

A confession - my nana has some of the worst taste in books ever. Literally all she reads are things like Angela's Ashes and A Child Called It. I'm not usually a fan of horribly tragic autobiographies, but I read this one of hers a while back and it stuck out in my mind as being different to all the rest. I re-read it quite recently and decided that yes, this was a very good book.


Ten Thousand Sorrows is the life story of Elizabeth Kim, a half-Korean lady who was born out of wedlock to a Korean mother and an American solider father who abandoned them both. When her mother refused to give her mixed-race illegitimate child up into slavery, she was killed in a horrific 'Honor Killing' by her father and brother while her child hid in the room and saw the whole thing. Elizabeth was maimed by her relatives and dumped in an orphanage, before eventually being adopted by a fundamentalist christian American couple, who named her at the age of 4 and took her out of Korea. Unbelievably almost, things continue to go downhill from there onwards.

To put it lightly, this book is heartbreaking. Elizabeth's life is certainly full enough to warrant a full-sized book about it, which is more than I can say for some other autobiographies I've read. Even now she has no idea what original name and her family name were, or even how old she is exactly (they guessed her age at the orphanage by her teeth). It stood out to be because it is so beautifully written in many places - Kim is a truly great writer and has a keen interest in reading and writing poetry, a talent that shines through the pages and drowns out any kind of self-pity that might have arisen alongside such a tragic story. The descriptions are raw and harsh, but there is a beauty to it all that is difficult to ignore.

Thankfully the book does end on somewhat of a high note, although I didn't get the feeling that Elizabeth Kim is quite fully healed from her experiences, nor would anybody expect her to be. This isn't an easy read, and it will very likely leave you amazed that any one person could have endured so much, but it is definitely worth your time if you should care to give it. 

I would give this book 4 stars out of 5

- Natalie