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Review ------ “Koh’s book is a tremendous gift. We’re so fortunate to have this literary reckoning from a tremendously talented writer. The Magical Language of Others is a wonder.” - The San Francisco Chronicle “A haunting, gorgeous narrative...lushly told. Brilliant.” - The Star Tribune “The Magical Language of Others is an exquisite, challenging, and stunning memoir. E. J. Koh intricately melds her personal story with a broader view of Korean history. Through these pages, you are asked to experience one family’s heartbreak, trauma, and complex love for each other. This memoir will pierce you.” - Crystal Hana Kim, If You Leave Me “In The Magical Language of Others, E.J. Koh writes of the boundary, between anonymity and naming, between absence and abandonment, between cruelty and safety for four generations of mothers and daughters, each speaking with an occupied heart and crossing narrative borders between Korea, Japan, and America. As a reader, you give yourself over to her narrative territory and the resetting of the borders of lineage, language, and lives lost.” - Shawn Wong, Homebase and American Knees “This memoir broke my heart. The tragedies that filled the lives of Koh's mother and grandmothers are woven into mythic, magic tales in Koh's hands. Only by Koh's grace and mastery are we not crushed by the stories within The Magical Language of Others. I could read this book a thousand times over.” - Sarah Blake, Naamah “E.J. Koh’s The Magical Language of Others grapples with intergenerational loss and love between mothers and daughters across time, war, and immigration. Koh’s painful journey is bridged by her mother’s letters, which she translates, unfolding the language of mothering and tenderness. Koh remarkably and beautifully translates the language of mothers as the language of survivors.” - Don Mee Choi, author of Hardly War “Indisputably brilliant. I read The Magical Language of Others in a single sitting--all the while never wanting it to end.” - Jeannie Vanasco, Things We Didn't Talk About When I Was a GIrl “A coming-of-age story, a family story, and a meditation on language and translation, with an emotional range to match.” - Caitlin Horrocks, The Vexations Read more ( javascript:void(0) ) About the Author ---------------- E. J. Koh is the author of poetry collection A LESSER LOVE, winner of the Pleiades Editors Prize (Louisiana State U. Press, 2017). Her poems, translations, and stories have appeared in Boston Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, World Literature Today, among others. She is the recipient of The MacDowell Colony and Kundiman fellowships, 2017 ALTA Emerging Translator Mentorship, and is Runner-Up for the 2018 Prairie Schooner Summer Nonfiction Prize. Read more ( javascript:void(0) )