I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki: The cult hit everyone is talking about

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Today’s review features yet another Korean book, one that was a major success in its native country, with the English-language translation courtesy of a certain Anton Hur. Therapy, especially when this was originally published, is not something that’s considered normal in South Korea. As someone who feels simply ✨hollow✨ rather than having, say, violent feelings and suicidal desire, this book absolutely got it. I too grapple with low self-esteem, being too critical (of myself and others), holding myself (and others) to obsessively high standards, letting myself show any measure of vulnerability, and a fundamental distrust towards others. At once personal and universal, this book is about finding a path to awareness, understanding, and wisdom.

I also wanted to feel comfortable, to feel safe, to speak and laugh, but my words just crumbled in my mouth. Everyone is just trying to be as okay as possible, after all-and seeing Sehee's processing of that in I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is sure to make readers feel a little less alone in their own attempts. Psychiatrist’s statements like: “We drink precisely to get drunk but now you’re envious of people who drink and don’t get drunk” or inquiring with an only slightly hidden shock why the author gained five kilos (“Really?Internalizing their behavior, she questioned and criticized herself to the point of depression and severe anxiety. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. And to conclude, this Freudian bale of hay ultimately validated my feelings (of not being the right reader for the book). I get that therapy is to some extent an outstanding Socratic dialogue but it felt like there should have been more of a guiding influence here to keep the author from looping into these cycles.

As someone who gets depressed and also has anxiety, this book sounded high-key relatable and I was really excited to read it. I will admit the formatting of the conversations between the therapist and author got a little tedious on a technical level. Seiten, die ich innerhalb von zwei Tagen verschlungen und dabei jede Seite mit jedem Wort aufgesogen habe. After three months of therapy the author states “Everything is a mess” and feels more out of control than before she started the therapy, which I fully understand, considering the low quality of sessions she had.

Sehee’s emotional recollections of growing up in an abusive household, struggling with self image, and turning to books as she learns to embrace solitude lose their potential poignancy when reconstructed in dialogue with her therapist: “ME: I’m also obsessive about my looks. I finished reading this book tonight, and while it wasn't what I expected, there were things about it that I enjoyed. The poetry (more accurately described as italicized notes-to-self with line breaks) remains strewn liberally through the pages, often summarizing the takeaway or the emotional impact of the events described: "I was / and still am / an exceptionally / easy target. Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published. Part of me wishes that this book could have taken only certain exchanges from her sessions, and incorporated these into longer pieces where the author considers the issues they discussed.

She has faced abuse and mistreatment of many kinds over the decades, but she touches on the most appalling passages lightly—though not so lightly you don't feel the torment of the media attention on the events leading up to her divorce from Tommy Lee. But surely to create something in me that didn’t exist before and to extend emotional solidarity to another person is one of the rites of adulthood.

this book made me emotional at certain points and i liked that it had an uplifting message at the end. In the end, reading this book was like experiencing someone's inner monologue: someone who's trying to figure out their own traumas and motivations, drifting from thought to thought at will. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor.