Crystal Hana Kim on the Mystery of Our Parents

“We will never know anyone that we love in a full capacity. I will never know the full story of who my mother is or who my father is. And my kid will never know the full story of me. I don’t think it has to be sad, but it’s something that I often return to.”

Crystal Hana Kim is the author of If You Leave Me, which was a Booklist Editor’s Choice title and named a best book of 2018 by over a dozen publications. Kim is the recipient of the 2022 National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35 Award and is a 2017 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize winner. Currently, she is the Visiting Assistant Professor at Queens College and a contributing editor at Apogee Journal. Her second novel, The Stone Home, is forthcoming from William Morrow / HarperCollins.