American Hagwon (Cardinal, Sept.; 1,000,000-copy announced first printing) by Min Jin Lee is an epic tale of the intertwined communities radiating outward from the extended Koh family, whose lives ricochet between South Korea, Australia, and the U.S., as their fortunes rise and fall and rise again. Lee is the author of Free Food for Millionaires (2007) and Pachinko (2017), a National Book Award finalist that was adapted into a critically acclaimed Apple TV series. As a child, she emigrated with her family from Seoul to New York City, where she still lives today.

You are a journalist, yet you write fiction about the Korean diaspora. What motivates you?

What I’m trying to understand is, when we live so far apart from the people that we love most, how does it change our experience of each other, and how do we change other people around us? How do they change us? I’m writing about Koreans primarily, but they really could be anybody, because I’m studying movement and migration. People may think of the word diaspora and think of some other group, but I actually think it’s happening to all of us. It’s the common condition these days, especially because the nature of work has changed so much. Even if we have each other close by, we don’t necessarily interact that often, especially with the introduction of modern devices.

What inspired you to write a novel centered on hagwons, the for-profit, private educational institutions so popular in South Korea that supplement the public schools?

This is the third volume of a quartet about the Korean diaspora, and I wanted to write about what Koreans around the world most value: education. They really care about it, although it’s also controversial. People have many thoughts about education, whether they like it or dislike it, whether it’s important or not important, or how young people should be educated. And what is the most important thing to Americans, even though you might have to break it down regionally? Education. I was struck by the consensus. It made me think that I’d have to write a Korean education novel.

Why is the story set during an era marked by two economic crises, the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and the 2008 recession in the U.S.?

Korea is a very old civilization, with lots of hierarchy and Confucian values. After the separation from North Korea following World War II, South Korea was permeated by American culture, including its philosophies about democracy and capitalism. It’s interesting to see how these crises played out in each country. When South Korea lost its currency value, it adopted all these extreme austerity measures, which destroyed the lives of many, many middle-class families. I don’t think most people understand what an impact the 1997 financial crisis had on the people of South Korea. I needed to understand what happened there, and that prompted me to write this book.

There’s so much about class, gender, and cultural identity packed into this novel. How did you conduct your research?

I was so tired after Pachinko. I thought I’d write a much easier book, and that just did not happen. I did a lot of field work, talking with the kinds of people who appear as characters in American Hagwon. I went to Australia five times, and I had to go to Orange County, Calif., even though I don’t know how to drive. I was going to set scenes in Los Angeles, but I couldn’t, because Orange County is where the Koreans are who are middle class or aspire to be. Orange County Koreans are very different from L.A. Koreans, so I had to adjust my understanding, and I had to rewrite every time that I got something wrong. I write realistic fiction, which means that I can’t ever have the reader believe that I got something wrong. As soon as the readers stop and go, I don’t believe her, it’s over.

Min Jin Lee will appear at the breakfast keynote and evening author reception on Feb. 25.

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