The Future Perfect cover art

The Future Perfect

A Novel
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The Future Perfect

By: Cay Kim
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About this listen

 A radiant, exquisitely told portrait of a young woman growing up between cultures, in search of her future self

Before you are anything, you are a daughter.

At first, you are a child at home in your mother’s belly: a beloved daughter, a vision of the future. But who will you become? At the Dol ceremony on your first birthday, dressed in a bright fuchsia hanbok, your family gathers around to see which item you’ll reach for that will determine the course of your life. You choose the pencil.

As your family moves from Seoul to snowy Minnesota, you and your mother find yourselves in a new American life that you must navigate together, mastering its language and customs. Soon enough, you are in pursuit of perfection—your mother marshaling you through a childhood of achievements to shape you into the person she most wants you to be. But you are not just your mother’s daughter, despite her sacrifices. As the years go by, you want to build a life between these two cultures that feels yours—an identity that lies somewhere in between your homeland and motherland.

Told in incandescent prose, Cay Kim’s debut novel is a portrait of a brilliant young woman growing up between worlds, and a glorious love letter to girlhood, family, and the great dreams we hold for ourselves, no matter where we’re from. Coming of Age Genre Fiction Literary Fiction United States World Literature

Critic reviews

“A book I have been waiting for all my life. Cay Kim has written a daring, sonic, incandescent debut, full of verve and heartache. A story about the pain and love between daughters and mothers, the deep gulf between desire and duty, and the particular experience of straddling both Korean and American homelands, this is a magnificent debut.” —Crystal Hana Kim, author of The Stone Home and If You Leave Me

“Timeless, taut, and daringly tempestuous . . . A masterful and unforgettable debut.” —Paul Beatty, author of the Booker Prize–winning The Sellout

"Elegant and deeply felt, this is a novel full of poise, precision and luminous prose. An assured debut." —Charles Yu, author of Interior Chinatown

“Intense, lyrical, heartfelt . . . Written with gorgeous attention to detail and a sense of wonder. A beauty.” —Yoon Choi, winner of the Whiting Award and author of Skinship

“A lyrically profound and triumphant coming-of-age novel.” —Nancy Jooyoun Kim, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Story of Mina Lee, a Reese’s Book Club Pick

“A masterpiece of concision and nuance, a searing picture of what it is to grow up between cultures." —Joshua Furst, author of Revolutionaries
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