PETTY LIES

Mira can neither forget nor forgive the Moon family and its cruelties. Both pushed her impoverished mother to open the gas in her apartment, dying by suicide and killing her son, leaving Mira utterly alone. So, when she finagles a job tutoring Yujae, the youngest Moon son, she finds herself well-positioned to seek revenge. Her role allows access to Yujae’s elder brother, Yuchan, whom she believes killed her mother’s dog and started the chain reaction that led to the vicious confrontation with Moon Jiwon that precipitated her mother’s suicide. Mira’s plan seems perfect. But as Bak reveals in an epistolary-style narrative that shifts among three people—Mira, Jiwon, and Yujae—the reality behind what Mira thinks she knows about the Moon family is far more complicated than it appears. Motivations are often cloaked in lies and/or cruelty; when characters are not engaging in some form of deceit, they are undermining each other. Mira, for example, lies that she seeks only to tutor Yujae while Yujae falsely tells everyone—except Mira—that his brother is a dog-killer. But as animal and human deaths pile up, the reader becomes privy to a chilling story involving sibling rivalry, maternal callousness, and vengeance exacted without regret. Bak skillfully weaves the themes of guilt, family, and retribution to create a psychologically potent story that is at once compelling and profoundly disturbing.