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A Love Story from the End of the World
- Author
- Juhea Kim
- Narrator
- Sue Jean Kim
- Publisher
- HarperCollins Publishers
- Publish Date
- 20 November 2025
- Run Time
- 7 hours 34 minutes
- Format
- Audiobook
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What to expect
From the acclaimed author of Beasts of a Little Land and Reese’s Book Club pick City of Night Birds, an exquisite story collection about humans in precarious balance with the natural world.
‘A rare jewel … essential reading for right now’ COCO MELLORS ‘Kim’s work is ambitious, elegant and deeply intellectual’ PANDORA SYKES'Resonant…affecting…lyrical…Throughout the collection, fleeting connections offer glimmers of hope…Her fiction offers a powerful reminder of what we stand to lose; that we are part of nature; and ‘we have within ourselves everything we need to save humanity’ Financial Times
'Finely wrought stories…examining human selfishness and finding gleaming moments of care and conviction, often prompted by an encounter with a nonhuman being. Humanness, Kim suggests, cannot be wrested from the natural world: when we lose the latter, we lose ourselves' The New Yorker
What does it mean to live on our miraculous planet?
Vivid, transportive, and heartfelt, each of these ten stories is a reflection of individual choice in the face of manmade apocalypse: in a near-future Seoul encased by a translucent biodome, a civil engineer charged with its upkeep contemplates an arranged marriage. An American painter travels to the South of France and is seduced by an entrepreneur who claims to have unlocked human consciousness. And where the Indian and Pacific Oceans meet, on an island that has turned into a gargantuan landfill from other countries’ waste, a boy has a fateful brush with K-pop superstars.
For readers of Richard Powers, Elif Shafak and Barbara Kingsolver, Juhea Kim’s first story collection views our world from breathtaking heights. A Love Story from the End of the World is an impassioned reminder that our humanity – and our best hope – will always be found in nature.
Critics Review
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'Each [story] grapples with the precarity of life on our small blue planet… but always in tandem with emotional precarity of the individuals who populate them. There’s playfulness to be had, too… Just lovely' Marie Claire
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'In this collection, love becomes a framework for understanding what is worth saving: the natural world, our capacity for human connection and the fragile but resilient threads that bind them. What emerges is not a pessimistic vision of apocalypse but a meditation on empathy and tenderness when such sentiments feel otherwise lost’ AnOther magazine
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'Encapsulates our very moment of ecological crisis' Country and Town House
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'Juhea Kim’s haunting, poetic prose explores climate change in 10 different fantastic, speculative short stories. Propelled by Kim’s love for humanity and her deep knowledge of nature and wildlife, the book is imaginative and thought-provoking' Christian Science Monitor
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'Impressive range that puts the author’s literary versatility on full display…Juhea Kim demonstrates once more that she is the master of using external struggles to guide the reader’s gaze inward…Her elegant, compassionate prose gently fans the air, stoking the last embers of our humanity…A deeply pensive reflection that strikes the soul' Korea Times
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'Resonant… affecting… lyrical…. [Kim]'s fiction offers a powerful reminder of what we stand to lose; that we are part of nature; and 'we have within ourselves everything we need to save humanity' Financial Times
User Reviews
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Details
- Author
- Juhea Kim
- Narrator
- Sue Jean Kim
- Duration
- 7 hours 34 minutes
- Release Date
- 20 November 2025
- ISBN
- 9780008785826
- Format
- Audiobook
- Publisher
- HarperCollins Publishers
- Genre
- Modern and contemporary fiction: literary and general, Magical realism, Climate change, Dystopian and utopian fiction, Speculative fiction, Narrative theme: environmental issues / the natural world, Short stories
Synopsis
From the acclaimed author of Beasts of a Little Land and Reese’s Book Club pick City of Night Birds, an exquisite story collection about humans in precarious balance with the natural world. ‘A rare jewel … essential reading for right now’ COCO MELLORS ‘Kim’s work is ambitious, elegant and deeply intellectual’ PANDORA SYKES 'Resonant…affecting…lyrical…Throughout the collection, fleeting connections offer glimmers of hope…Her fiction offers a powerful reminder of what we stand to lose; that we are part of nature; and ‘we have within ourselves everything we need to save humanity’ Financial Times 'Finely wrought stories…examining human selfishness and finding gleaming moments of care and conviction, often prompted by an encounter with a nonhuman being. Humanness, Kim suggests, cannot be wrested from the natural world: when we lose the latter, we lose ourselves' The New Yorker What does it mean to live on our miraculous planet? Vivid, transportive, and heartfelt, each of these ten stories is a reflection of individual choice in the face of manmade apocalypse: in a near-future Seoul encased by a translucent biodome, a civil engineer charged with its upkeep contemplates an arranged marriage. An American painter travels to the South of France and is seduced by an entrepreneur who claims to have unlocked human consciousness. And where the Indian and Pacific Oceans meet, on an island that has turned into a gargantuan landfill from other countries’ waste, a boy has a fateful brush with K-pop superstars. For readers of Richard Powers, Elif Shafak and Barbara Kingsolver, Juhea Kim’s first story collection views our world from breathtaking heights. A Love Story from the End of the World is an impassioned reminder that our humanity – and our best hope – will always be found in nature.
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