Seoul, stardom & staged funerals in Funereal by Giacomo Lee, out now.

Giacomo Lee
SOKO: South Korea
Published in
2 min readApr 22, 2015

--

The first Western novel on Koreans in 21st Century Seoul.

http://giacomolee.net/

Funereal (adjective) — ‘Appropriate for or suggestive of a funeral; mournful.’

Funereal by Giacomo Lee is the first ever Western-English novel about Koreans living in modern-day South Korea. It’s literary fiction. It’s neon-noir. It’s a contemporary fable, and kind of ‘Korean Kafkaesque‘. Find it in paperback via Signal 8 Press, Amazon and Book Depository. Ebook out on Amazon, iTunes, Smashwords, Nook & Kobo.

http://giacomolee.com/

Synopsis:

Soobin Shin is an aspiring young woman in a near-future version of Seoul. Ever since her college graduation, she has struggled to escape from her dead-end job in a doughnut chain. Her twin sister Hyewon is one of Korea’s most recognizable models, but Soobin just can’t seem to find her lucky break… until one evening, a creepy regular customer offers her a job in a company he has just started. OneLife Korea is going to save South Korea one funeral at a time… by burying the living in order to help them find some peace of mind in the country with the highest suicide rate in the developed world.

Soobin has already lost her mother, and her relationship with her boyfriend is on the rocks. What else does she have to lose? Everything at OneLife Korea seems perfect until high-profile clients actually start dying. Soobin Shin is Korea’s beautiful new angel of death, and Funereal is a snapshot of a city in flux, taking a look at the dark side to surgery, survival, and k-pop stardom in the near future of one of Asia’s most dynamic capitals.

--

--

Giacomo Lee
SOKO: South Korea

Giacomo is a writer for VICE, Creative Boom, Little White Lies, Long Live Vinyl and more. Check out his Seoul cyberpunk novel Funereal