Overview
From the award-winning author of Flux comes "an endearing novel about second chances" (The Washington Post), with wise insights into love, family, and the art of sushi. "Wise and poignant with] mouthwatering descriptions of food . . . I Leave It Up to You is about finding--or rediscovering--the people who make hardship worth enduring."--Bobby Finger, The New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice) A coma can change a man, but the world Jack Jr. awakens to is one he barely recognizes. His advertising job is history, his Manhattan apartment is gone, and the love of his life has left him behind. He's been asleep for two years; with no one to turn to, he realizes it's been ten years since he last saw his family. Lost and disoriented, he makes a reluctant homecoming back to the bustling Korean American enclave of Fort Lee, New Jersey; back into the waiting arms of his parents, who are operating under the illusion that he never left; and back to Joja, their ever-struggling sushi restaurant that he was set to inherit before he ran away from it all. As he steps back into the life he abandoned--learning his Appa's life lessons over crates of tuna on bleary-eyed 4 a.m. fish runs, doling out amberjack behind the omakase counter while his Umma tallies the night's pitiful number of customers, and sparring with his recovering alcoholic brother, James--he embraces new roles, too: that of romantic interest to the nurse who took care of him, and that of sage (but underqualified) uncle to his gangly teenage nephew. There is value in the joyous rhythms of this once-abandoned life. But second chances are an even messier business than running a restaurant, and the lure of a self-determined path might, once again, prove too hard to resist.
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Details
- ISBN-13: 9780593727058
- ISBN-10: 0593727053
- Publisher: Ballantine Books
- Publish Date: March 2025
- Dimensions: 9.46 x 6.37 x 1.1 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.21 pounds
- Page Count: 320
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- 1
This isn’t a spoiler, but at the very end of Jinwoo Chong’s I Leave It Up to You, the narrator and protagonist, Jack Jr., runs after a bus. After spending so much time with this son of Korean immigrants, you know exactly why he wants to catch this bus, and there’s nothing you can do but cheer.
The story opens with Jack Jr. (it’s important to him that everyone remember the Jr.) emerging from a two-year coma. He’s been on a respirator, so you may first assume that he’s a victim of COVID-19. That isn’t the case, but COVID does play a surprising role in the story later on. Once he’s finally awake, his family rushes to the hospital. They’re his mother, Ari, his father, Jack Sr., and his brother, James, with whom Jack Jr. has never gotten along. James is seven years older than Jack Jr., and the father of snarky, lovable, 16-year-old Juno.
Jack Jr. learns quickly that the world has changed. James has a second son, a baby, born while his uncle was still comatose. Jack Jr.’s old job, old apartment and old relationships are gone. He has to move back in with his parents and resume working at the family restaurant he abandoned when he was a teenager. It’s a sushi restaurant, which, if you’re familiar with the history of Japan’s colonization of Korea, is noteworthy. Jack Sr.’s father swore he’d never speak to him again if he went to Japan to become a sushi master, but Jack Sr. went anyway. This was the beginning of the tangled paternal and filial expectations, the pull between self-actualization and familial obligations, that bedevil this fractious but loving family.
Chong, author of Flux, is masterful at presenting his characters and describing their world. Much of I Leave It Up To You is set during a New Jersey winter, and his depictions of ice, snow, frost and freezing cold might make your teeth chatter. His description of Jack Jr. struggling out of his coma is alone worth the price of admission. You won’t forget this big-hearted, beautifully written book.
This isn’t a spoiler, but at the very end of Jinwoo Chong’s I Leave It Up to You, the narrator and protagonist, Jack Jr., runs after a bus. After spending so much time with this son of Korean immigrants, you know exactly why he wants to catch this bus, and there’s nothing you can do but cheer.
The story opens with Jack Jr. (it’s important to him that everyone remember the Jr.) emerging from a two-year coma. He’s been on a respirator, so you may first assume that he’s a victim of COVID-19. That isn’t the case, but COVID does play a surprising role in the story later on. Once he’s finally awake, his family rushes to the hospital. They’re his mother, Ari, his father, Jack Sr., and his brother, James, with whom Jack Jr. has never gotten along. James is seven years older than Jack Jr., and the father of snarky, lovable, 16-year-old Juno.
Jack Jr. learns quickly that the world has changed. James has a second son, a baby, born while his uncle was still comatose. Jack Jr.’s old job, old apartment and old relationships are gone. He has to move back in with his parents and resume working at the family restaurant he abandoned when he was a teenager. It’s a sushi restaurant, which, if you’re familiar with the history of Japan’s colonization of Korea, is noteworthy. Jack Sr.’s father swore he’d never speak to him again if he went to Japan to become a sushi master, but Jack Sr. went anyway. This was the beginning of the tangled paternal and filial expectations, the pull between self-actualization and familial obligations, that bedevil this fractious but loving family.
Chong, author of Flux, is masterful at presenting his characters and describing their world. Much of I Leave It Up To You is set during a New Jersey winter, and his depictions of ice, snow, frost and freezing cold might make your teeth chatter. His description of Jack Jr. struggling out of his coma is alone worth the price of admission. You won’t forget this big-hearted, beautifully written book.