Book Report: The Island of Sea Women

25. Lisa See, The Island of Sea Women (2019) (5/8/21)

This is an excellent book that combines a fascinating culture, a history I had not been aware of, and a tale of a long, yet fraught friendship. The culture in question is that of the haenyeo of Jeju Island, south of South Korea: women who harvest the bounty of the sea. Theirs is a matrilocal society, in which the women are in charge of making a living, while the men tend the children and keep house. The history begins in 1938, when Japan occupied Korea, and continues through World War II, the horrific massacres of 1948–49 on Jeju Island, the Korean War, and into the 1970s, which allows us to see how society changed over those years. And the friendship is between Young-sook and Mi-ja, two haenyeo of different backgrounds. There is a framing story as well, set in 2008, when Young-sook, now in her eighties, is approached by a Korean-American family and asked if she recognizes a woman in a photo. Of course, it is Mi-ja, and that launches the full story of their close friendship and how it went awry. 

The writing is excellent, but curiously, I did not flag any passages—maybe simply because I was caught up in the story. It starts off a bit slowly with a certain distance as See describes the women's culture, how they work, what it means to cultivate both dry- and wet-fields, why they engaged in "leaving-home water-work" in Vladivostok, how they fit into the larger society, what the expectations were for family life. See certainly did her research, and it shows in the somewhat encyclopedic treatment. As the two girls become women, get married, have children, the story becomes more emotionally invested, leading ultimately to a resolution that is quite believable and moving. If too late...