A review by oliviaclaire
If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha

dark emotional reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This book is a multi-POV story set in Korea (mainly Seoul). It revolves around four women; Kyuri, Miho, Ara, and Wonna and the common themes of misogyny, beauty standards and rigorous gender norms for women in Korea. While this book was very insightful, and I was particularly taken with Kyuri's story of the 'room salons' of Seoul and an obsession with plastic surgery in order to achieve a desirable beauty standard, it is quite short and tries to cover a lot of issues without having the time and space to go into great enough depth on any one in particular. I think perhaps if Wonna's perspective (an expectant mother living in the same building as the other three protagonists) was removed, it might have made room for Cha to properly sink her teeth into the other three stories and expand on the themes they just barely touch on in the book's current format eg. ableism and disability, mental health struggles etc. 

All in all, this book is very well written but it doesn't dive deep enough to build a fully fleshed story arc for most of our characters and therefore ends without you feeling like it has been a satisfying story. 
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