The White Book

From Booker Prize-winner and literary phenomenon Han Kang, a lyrical and disquieting exploration of personal grief, written through the prism of the color white.

While on a writer's residency, a nameless narrator wanders the twin white worlds of the blank page and snowy Warsaw. The White Book becomes a meditation on the color white, as well as a fictional journey inspired by an older sister who died in her mother's arms, a few hours old. The narrator grapples with the tragedy that has haunted her family, an event she colors in stark white amp;mdash; breast milk, swaddling bands, the baby's rice cake-colored skin amp;mdash; and, from here, visits all that glows in her memory: from a white dog to sugar cubes.

As the writer reckons with the enormity of her sister's death, Han Kang's trademark frank and chilling prose is softened by retrospection, introspection, and a deep sense of resilience and love. The White Book amp;mdash; ultimately a letter from Kang to her sister amp;mdash; offers powerful philosophy and personal psychology on the tenacity and fragility of the human spirit and our attempts to graft new life from the ashes of destruction.