In 1930s Japanese-occupied Korea, Lee Woo-cheol was a running prodigy and a contender for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics. But he would have had to run under the Japanese flag.

Nearly a century later, his granddaughter is living in Japan and training to run a marathon herself. She summons Korean shamans to hold an intense, transcendent ritual to connect with Lee Woo-cheol. When his ghost appears, alongside those of his brother Lee Woo-Gun, and their young neighbor, who was forced to become a comfort woman to Japanese soldiers stationed in China during World War II, she must uncover their stories to free their souls.

What she discovers is at the heart of this sweeping, majestic novel about a family that endured death, love, betrayal, war, political upheaval, and ghosts, both vengeful and wistful. A poetic masterpiece from the writer of Tokyo Ueno Station, The End of August is a marathon of literature.

710 pages. Hardcover. 

About the Author

A Korean author writing in Japanese, Yu Miri has over twenty books to her name. She received Japan's most prestigious literary award, the Akutagawa Prize, and her novel Tokyo Ueno Station won the 2020 National Book Award for Translated Literature. After the earthquake and tsunami in Fukushima, she relocated there and has opened a bookstore and theater space.

Morgan Giles is a literary translator. Her translation of Yu Miri's Tokyo Ueno Station won the 2020 National Book award for Translated Literature. She lives in London.