VOL.93/2026.04

Korean Authors

 

Lee Kkoch-nim: The Voice of Teenagers, Illuminating the Shadows of Adolescent Anxiety and Loneliness Through Fiction

 

 

2026.03

 

 

There is a literary writer for the future of Korean literature who embraces the anxiety and loneliness of adolescents and the hearts of children. She won the Grand Prize at the Munhakdongne Young Adult Literature Award for I Will Cross the World to Get to You. We would like to hear the story of author Lee Kkoch-nim, an icon of Korean young adult literature who wrote The Girl You Want to Kill, The Girl You Want to Kill 2, A Bite of Summer, Of Course I Like You, Luck is Coming Your Way, and One night When I Wasn’t There.

 

 

 

 

 

Q. Your works are loved not only in Korea but also in various cultural spheres. What do you think is the power that allowed your novels to cross borders and move the hearts of readers?

 

I was invited to the Mantova Festivaletteratura (Book Festival) in Italy last year, and I heard that I Will Cross the World to Get to You is read there as a book for mothers and daughters together. I also heard many stories about mothers and daughters with strained relationships reconciling after giving this book to each other as a gift. I realized that even if cultures are different, the emotions experienced during adolescence, such as anxiety, loneliness, family relationships, and friendships, are similar. In particular, because readers can each imagine characters a little differently in a novel, they seem to think of it more as “my story." I think it is truly an amazing thing that literature becomes a new method of communication and a way to convey one's heart. It was a boundless honor that the novels I wrote were part of the process of conveying hearts.

 

 

 

 

 

Q. Was there a particular reason you started writing young adult literature?

 

It was when I was a high school student that I began to dream of becoming a writer. At that time, I thought my life was unhappy in every aspect. If you were to ask if that was actually the case, of course, it was not. There was only a tiny bit of misfortune like a speck of dust amidst tremendous luck. However, I was going through a foolish puberty, and therefore I took the luck I had for granted. It is an embarrassing thing. But at that time, I quite seriously confined myself within a fence of misfortune and hated myself. Since my heart was lonely, I went to the school library looking for a place with few people. No matter where I looked in the school, there was no place with fewer people than the library. At that time, high school students had night self-study until 10 PM, and everyone was busy only with studying, so they did not seem to come to the library to read books.

I did not like books very much, but it was awkward to just sit still in the library, so I started reading. That nurtured my dream. The reason I fell for novels and started nurturing the dream of becoming a writer was because of the countless lives within the books. There were truly so many lives. I could understand the inner thoughts of many people that cannot be known unless spoken, and there were painful lives that I had never even imagined. As I read books, countless hours of reflection and emotion, as well as hours of interest and excitement, passed by. In my senior year of high school, I was a child somewhat distant from writing, to the extent that my teacher asked back what I was talking about when I said I wanted to be a writer. When the teacher asked back, I just scratched my head and replied that it was nothing, and that I just did not know well what I wanted to become. I think even I thought it was a bit out of the blue.

I somehow made it to the Department of Creative Writing, but I realized that I was just sitting there blankly among talented peers. I thought that going to the Department of Creative Writing would mean they would teach me how to write a novel just like they teach the multiplication tables, but that was not the case. Since there are no right answers in writing, there were no miraculous ways of writing. There was nothing else but to sit steadily and wrestle with writing, and to write and write again even if you get exhausted.

To be honest, at that time, I only dreamed of becoming a “writer” and did not even think about what kind of pieces I should write. I just wanted to be a writer without even setting a direction. However, I simply did not know how on earth I was supposed to write a novel. The answer I heard most often was to read many books. So I think I practically lived in the school library every day. I borrowed books from the library and read them frantically. If you were to ask if I engaged in deep reading, I would answer “well," but if you ask if I found something there, I can answer “yes.”

I discovered a book called Wandeuki there. Honestly, when I first saw Wandeuki, I wondered why a comic book was stuck on the shelf. I remember reading the entire book right where I stood while lightly flipping through it to change my mood. Wait, what is this? Why is it so fun and lovely? What is this? While standing there blankly and blinking my eyes, I realized that I was smiling. After finding out that it was the winner of the 1st Young Adult Literature Award started by Changbi, I searched the internet to find out what young adult literature was.

At that time, I did not even know that young adult literature existed. I only recognized that there were broadly novels, poetry, and children's literature. That was partly because of my ignorance, but also because the proportion of young adult literature within the overall literature of our country was that low. When I said I wanted to do young adult literature, even the professors told me, half-jokingly and half-seriously, why I was trying to take such a difficult path. I still remember it. They said things like, “Living as a novelist is a difficult thing. People do not read books much. But teenagers read even less. Are you still going to do young adult literature?” Since it is literature for teenagers, but the main readership does not read books, it was actually a path that was difficult beyond measure. Still, I wanted to do it. I thought that even if many people do not read what I write, if one teenager who is going through a lonely and difficult time like I did is comforted, realizes that there are more lives out there, and begins to dream of the future, that would be enough.

Life is truly mysterious. When I see that the emotions of those days, when I used to resentfully wonder why I was always so solitary and lonely while going through a difficult adolescence, have now become the greatest nourishment for writing novels.

 

 

 

 

Q. Please tell us what you think are the characteristics of young adult literature. What kind of influence can young adult literature have on readers?

 

I believe the most prominent characteristic of young adult literature is that its readership is not limited to teenagers. It attracts a wide range of readers, from 10-year-old children who love reading and seek stories beyond children's literature, to adolescents, and even adults. Parents who wish to read and share conversations with their children, as well as teachers who read to use the books as classroom materials, also look for young adult literature.

In a sense, it encompasses a balanced audience of future teenagers, current teenagers, and those who were teenagers in the past. While a book read by everyone from children to adults sounds wonderful in theory, but in reality, it is actually a challenging aspect for a writer. Since the way past, present, and future generations perceive adolescence differs slightly, and the generational gap ranges from a few years to several decades, it is difficult to persuade and connect with all these readers.

The influence that young adult literature has on readers is undoubtedly “understanding” and “communication.” I have met many adult readers who said they enjoyed communicating and sharing stories with their children who have reached adolescence while reading books together. To be honest, I felt a bit moved to tears. In the past, many parents were heartbroken because communication with their teenage children was cut off, but seeing so many parents today actively striving to understand adolescents really touched my heart. Conversely, teenage readers have also begun to understand the circumstances of adults. They come to realize that they can somewhat understand the process of how adults change or the reasons why they had no choice but to act a certain way. As it becomes “my” story, “my family’s” story, and “my friend’s” story, and eventually “our school’s” story, it reaches the hearts of readers. Watching people try to understand each other more and share more stories, I could feel that young adult literature has moved closely into the lives of readers.

 

 

 

 

Q. Your novels are set to communicate with readers in new ways through other media, such as dramas, moving beyond the books themselves. Please share your thoughts on this.

 

I Will Cross the World to Get to You is being made into a drama, and A Bite of Summer is coming out as a movie, a drama, and even a webtoon. Honestly, it still does not feel real. At first, I was so excited that I could not even sleep at the thought of my books being adapted into visual media. But now, I am waiting a bit more calmly and keeping my mind at ease. In fact, besides these books, other titles had their film and drama productions confirmed and even went through the contracting process, only to have the productions fall through a few years later. I have learned that I should accept everything calmly until the results are actually out.

Nevertheless, the fact that my stories appear attractive not only to teenage readers but also to those who create visual media is quite thrilling. I am also curious about how much the stories will change or stay the same as they are transformed into visual media. After all, novels and visual media are such different areas.

 

 

 

 

Q. Lastly, is there a message you would like to convey to your many readers, including the teenage readers who read your novels? Please share a few words for those who love you and your work.

 

 

I do not see the world as only beautiful. On the other hand, I do not see only its ugly side either. I believe that while there are countless good and righteous people who sustain the world, there are also countless dark and twisted people who throw it into chaos. Because of this, the stories I write sometimes move between extremes. While some novels are full of individualists, others are filled with a sense of community. At times I view the world cynically and coldly, while at other times I view it with warmth and cherish it.

When I write a novel, I do not write to convey just one side to my readers. This is because I still do not know the “right answer" to living life, and I do not know what kind of life is the most proper one myself. I simply practice the act of “looking." I look at a single scene, imagine the stories behind it, and write them down.

Some teenage readers look at an unhappy protagonist and ask why the characters in the book are so miserable, saying they do not have a single friend like that around them. On the other hand, there are readers who look at the same unhappy protagonist and tell me that it is a “fake misery," claiming that far more terrible things happen countless times in their actual surroundings. Whenever I hear such stories, I think about how so many teenagers still believe that only the things happening around them are the truth. In fact, countless unbelievably warm things happen in the world, and conversely, countless events far more cruel than the terrible things in novels occur as well.

I want to be a writer who conveys the stories of countless people living many different lives. To every reader who picks up my books, I want to say that this is what life is—that there are infinite lives we do not know of and lives we cannot possibly understand. By looking at all those different lives, we eventually come to understand others. In that way, I want to support the lives of my teenage readers, who still have countless days ahead of them. So, I want to tell them that even if it is hard and even if you get exhausted, keep taking one step at a time, for wonderfully sunny days are waiting for you.

 

 

 

---

Written by Lee Kkoch-nim (Novelist)

Lee Kkoch-nim is a South Korean YA novelist known for page-turning stories loved by countless readers. She confronts social issues with clarity while delivering gripping plots. Her books are consistent bestsellers, with rights sold in more than ten countries.