Pachinko

History is rarely kind. The epic saga of Ming Jin Lee tells the story of several generations of an impoverished but proud immigrant family who stubbornly try to take their destiny into their own hands.

In the early 1900s, young Sanja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls in love with a rich stranger she meets at the seaside. He promises to put the whole world at her feet, but when Sanja learns that she is pregnant and that her lover is already married, she refuses to become his dependent. Instead, the girl accepts a marriage proposal from a soft-hearted sickly priest who is on his way to Japan. Sanji's decision to leave his homeland and end his relationship with her son's domineering father sets off a dramatic saga that reverberates through generations.

"Pachinko" is a story about the rejection at the official and public levels that Japanese people of Korean descent experienced and still experience in Japan.

Min Jin Lee's novel became one of the finalists for the National Book Award. A New York Times bestseller, Pachinko was named to USA Today, the BBC, and the New York Public Library's 10 Best Books of the Year. It also made 75 lists of the best books of the year, including lists from NPR, PBS, and CNN.