K-Book Trends -

Search word : "Novel", Search result : 616

[TREND / BOOK TRIP]

People’s Lives Seen Through the National History of Chaos and Turbulence

Book Trip [A Trip to Literary Museums ③] People’s Lives Seen Through the NationalHistory of Chaos and Turbulence Boseong-gun, Jeollanam-do: The Jo Jung-Rae Taebaek Mountain Range Literature Museum 2024.07.01 Literary museums are the most effective place to deepen your understanding of writers and their works, and to fully appreciate them. This is because they exhibit works in a variety of ways and present writers’ biographies, enabling us to walk into the world of literature with a richer perspective. So, sometimes, a trip to a literary museum is enough to make us more mature readers. In this edition of Book Trip, we traveled to Jeollanam-do, Boseong-gun, the hometown of Jo Jung-Rae, a master of Korean literature and the writer of Taebaeksanmaek (meaning Taebaek Mountain Range)(Hainaim Publishing), the ultimate saga novel. Aside from the pleasure of discovering traces of Taebaeksanmaek around every corner, Boseong-gun has much to offer, as it breathes th...

VOL.72 / 2024.07

[INFORMATION / NEW BOOKS]

How close are we, and how far apart?

New Books How close are we, and how far apart? 2026.04 Kim Yeon-su, Hirano Keiichiro, Nearby World (2026) Nearby World, a collaborative project planned and written by Kim Yeon-su and Hirano Keiichiro, prominent novelists representing Korea and Japan, has been published. Nearby World is the first installment of the Cross series, in which two authors living in different languages and cultures select a theme, in this case, ethical dilemmas, and each complete a work to be bound into a single volume. Author Kim Yeon-su explains that the term ethical is not a binary distinction between right and wrong, but rather an attitude of contemplating each person's own truth and sense of rightness within events where the desires of countless humans are intertwined. The volume includes Kim Yeon-su's Our Failure followed by Hirano Keiichiro's The Decisive Moment, concluding w...

VOL.93 / 2026.04

[INFORMATION / BEST SELLERS]

Spring 2026 Bestseller List

Best Sellers Spring 2026 Bestseller List 2026.04 Major franchises dominate the majority of South Korea's offline bookstore market. Currently, four major franchises—Kyobo Book Centre, Youngpoong Bookstore, Jongno Books, and Arc N Book—are competing in the offline retail sector. Starting with Kyobo Book Centre, which has the largest number of branches, followed by Youngpoong Bookstore, Jongno Books, and Arc N Book, we will examine the top 10 best-selling books. In the previous issue, we examined the bestsellers of Kyobo Book Centre, Korea's largest bookstore franchise. For this April issue, as the second part of our offline bookstore bestseller analysis, we looked at the bestsellers of Youngpoong Bookstore for the first week of March. The top-ranked book at Youngpoong Bookstore during this period was the picture book Mom Became a Ghost! published by Gilbut Children’s Books. It ...

VOL.93 / 2026.04

[INFORMATION / K-BOOK MAP]

Where Literature Dwells - Bridging the Past and Present of Korean Literature through Its Museums -

K-Book Map Where Literature Dwells- Bridging the Past and Present of Korean Literature through Its Museums - 2026.04 Literary museums dedicated to specific writers hold profound significance. They serve as cultural archives that reveal the various elements behind the birth of a literary masterpiece. Numerous such museums operate across Korea today. Among them, we would like to introduce three locations selected for their historical and regional balance: the Yun Dong-ju Literature Museum in Seoul (Yun Dong-ju: 1917–1945), the Pak Kyongni Literature Park in Wonju, Gangwon-do (Pak Kyongni: 1926–2008), and the Na Tae-joo Pulkkot Literary House in Gongju, Chungnam (Na Tae-joo: 1945–). Yun Dong-ju was a poet who focused on self-reflection and maintaining a human conscience despite the oppression of the colonial era. Pak Kyongni was a novelist who gave form to the turbulence of modern Korean history thr...

VOL.93 / 2026.04

[INFORMATION / AGENCY LIST]

Agency List

Agency List Agency List 2026.04 Abba Communication Ltd. Launched as a translation and interpretation agency in 204, Abba Communication (Abba here after) now also acts as a copyright agency. Abba supports young Korean publishers who are aspiring to build experiences in moving on to the international market, providing consultation on the way until they become global. Abba’s special forte is its excellent professional team with expertise in re-writing and/or editing synopses and introductions into texts both competitive and persuasive. Other services Abba provides include translating original materials and creating promotional texts. Focused Subjects LiberalArts : Biography, Management, Negotiation &n...

VOL.93 / 2026.04

[TREND / TOPIC]

Development and Transformation of Korean Young Adult Fiction

Topic Development and Transformation of Korean Young Adult Fiction 2024.06.03 “Young Adult (YA)” is a keyword that can’t be left out when discussing Korean literature in recent years. In fact, “recent” might not be the right word. It was in 2021 when the first article on the topic of “young adult fiction” appeared in K-Book Trends, and Sohn Won-Pyung’s Almond (Dazzling Publishers), which was mentioned as a work that led the young adult market at that time, was published in 2017. However, the term “young adult” appears in the submission guidelines of new fiction contests, in the names and intentions of newly conceived novel series, and in the introductions of young adult SF or fantasy novels. As such, young adult fiction is expanding and changing at a remarkably rapid pace. This growth can be attributed to the steady improvement of Korean young adult fiction, the changes in general fiction, and readers’ enthusiasm for new genres. S...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[TREND / BOOK TRIP]

In Search of a Garden Where Our Beautiful Korean Language Breathes

Book Trip [A Trip to Literary Museums ②] In Search of a Garden Where Our BeautifulKorean Language Breathes Introducing Sonagi Village at Hwang Sun-won, Literary Housein Yangpyeong-gun, Gyeonggi-do, and Beyond 2024.06.03 The works of Hwang Sun-Won have a solid presence in Korean literature. The literary world he has built transcends time, genre, and ideology, naturally expressing the most Korean emotions. It was around 1952, when Korea was undergoing the Korean War, when his representative short story Rain Shower (read Sonagi in Korean) was released. However, it is difficult to recognize such a period from the portrayal of the two main characters in the novel. The only clue that connects the story to reality is the place name “Yangpyeong” that appears at the end. The thoughts that germinated in this place became the driving force for creating a literary space, and it led to new attempts to reinterpret the work in various ways.The Sonagi Village in the Hwa...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[INFORMATION / BEST SELLERS]

New Spring, Books Worth Your Attention

Best Sellers New Spring, Books Worth Your Attention 2026.03 As we approach the spring of 2026, the bestseller charts for the second week of February once again demonstrated the enduring power of fiction, with novels claiming six of the top ten spots. For our 2026 feature, we move beyond the digital sphere to focus on brick-and-mortar bookstores, where readers can personally browse the shelves, feel the texture of the printed type, and choose their books through a physical encounter. In South Korea, major franchises occupy the majority of the physical bookstore market. Currently, four main franchises—Kyobo Book Centre, Youngpoong Bookstore, Jongno Books, and Arc N Book—are in competition. We intend to examine the top ten books across these locations, starting with Kyobo Book Centre, which holds the largest number of branches, followed by Y...

VOL.92 / 2026.03

[INFORMATION / AGENCY LIST]

Agency List

Agency List Agency List 2026.03 Abba Communication Ltd. Launched as a translation and interpretation agency in 204, Abba Communication (Abba here after) now also acts as a copyright agency. Abba supports young Korean publishers who are aspiring to build experiences in moving on to the international market, providing consultation on the way until they become global. Abba’s special forte is its excellent professional team with expertise in re-writing and/or editing synopses and introductions into texts both competitive and persuasive. Other services Abba provides include translating original materials and creating promotional texts. Focused Subjects LiberalArts : Biography, Management, Negotiation &n...

VOL.92 / 2026.03

[INFORMATION / BEST SELLERS]

Which Foreign Books Did Korean Readers Choose in 2025?

Best Sellers Which Foreign Books Did Korean Readers Choose in 2025? 2026.02 "Interest in Korean fiction" is an indispensable phrase when explaining recent publishing trends in Korea. Thanks to the halo effect of Han Kang's Nobel Prize in Literature win in 2024, Korean novels swept the top spots on the comprehensive bestseller lists last year. The slump in non-fiction books, driven by the commercialization of generative artificial intelligence (AI), also played a significant role. The prevailing view in the industry is that the surge in Korean fiction—and Korean literature at large—is a "butterfly effect" resulting from the contraction of the local non-fiction market, a sector traditionally dominated by renowned foreign authors rather than domestic ones. However, this situation may present a unique opportuni...

VOL.91 / 2026.02

VOL.95/2026.06

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