How lives are measured against pain: “Lemon” by Kwon Yeo-sun
“Lemon” by Kwon Yeo-sun was published in Italy in 2022 by Il Saggiatore, in the translation made by Benedetta Merlini. This short novel (less than 150 pages long) from a female South Korean author, knows how to take its time and stay well imprinted in the memory even once finished.
The plot
Kim Hae-on is murdered in her teens and her lifeless body is found in a park by a passing couple. It’s the day after the World Cup final held in South Korea. All Kim Hae-on is wearing is a yellow dress. Her skull is crushed, but no one knows who killed her, and the police investigation finds no culprit. The two suspects both have alibis. So the case falls into oblivion but leaves indelible traces in the lives of Hae-on’s family members and other people who knew her.
We discover everything (or almost everything) from three perspectives, which begins many years after the girl’s death, with the reconstruction of the interrogation of delivery boy Han Manu, one of the suspects. He says he saw Hae-on in the car of another high school boy, Shin Jeong-jun. The son of a wealthy accountant, Jeong-jun is the other suspect, as he may have been the last to see young Hae-on alive. This could have been a story where the weaker and poorer pay for this crime and the richer one manages to escape the law, but it’s not “Lemon”’s case. In fact, both alibis are sufficient for the suspects to avoid being charged, so the case remains unsolved.
However, Hae-on’s sister cannot find peace: over time, she continues to search for the truth and begins by looking for Han Manu, whom she has branded as responsible. Da-on is one of the narrating voices: she’s a woman broken by the pain of loss, which not only took away her smile and the carefreeness of living but pushed her to transform into a copy of her deceased sister, through plastic surgery. Da-on’s thoughts alternate with those of Shangui, an older girl known at the school poetry club. This common passion, developed with talent and different methods by both, had brought them closer during high school. When they meet again, years have passed since the evening that forever changed Da-on’s perspective towards the world. But Shangui also lived through part of the trauma, and she tells of the atmosphere that reigned in the school afterward.
A third, more mysterious voice is added to theirs, introducing new details about the death of Hae-on that perhaps make it possible to understand better what happened that distant evening.
In eight chapters, all with a meaningful name and a date, the writing of Kwon Yeo-sun is fast and sharp, quick and continuous. On the one hand, there’s the temptation to read more and try to understand more, while on the other, there’s the need to stop and metabolize.
The lemon from the title returns not only in the yellow of the dress with which the victim is found but also in the sharpness of certain passages that reflect that of life. Existences terrified by a tragic event, but also by the twists of fate, and connected by a sense of bewilderment and, in some way, by the isolation one can encounter in society.
The author: Kwon Yeo-sun
Kwon Yeo-sun was born in Andong in 1965. She has won several literary awards, including the prestigious Sangsang Literary Award. In 2019 she published “Lemon”, her first novel translated into English and Italian.
