Same Bed Different Dreams: A Novel
An ambitious, multi-layered novel praised by critics; it won the LA Times Book Prize for Fiction and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
Work Information
An ambitious, multi-layered novel praised by critics; it won the LA Times Book Prize for Fiction and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • A wild, sweeping novel that imagines an alternate secret history of Korea and the traces it leaves on the present—loaded with assassins and mad poets, RPGs and slasher films, pop bands and the perils of social media “Your view of twentieth-century history will be enlarged and altered. . . . A Gravity’s Rainbow for another war, an unfinished war.” —Jonathan Lethem, author of The Fortress of Solitude WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE • ONE OF PUBLISHERS WEEKLY’S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS’ CHOICE A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Public Library, Polygon, Kirkus Reviews In 1919, far-flung patriots establish the Korean Provisional Government to protest the Japanese occupation of their country. This government-in-exile proves mostly symbolic, though, and after Japan’s defeat in World War II, the KPG dissolves and civil war erupts, resulting in the tragic North-South split that remains today. But what if the KPG still existed—now working toward a unified Korea, secretly pulling levers to further its aims? Same Bed Different Dreams weaves together three distinct narrative voices with an archive of mysterious images, and twists reality like a kaleidoscope. Korean history, American pop culture, and our tech-fraught lives come together in this extraordinary and unforgettable novel. Soon Sheen, a former writer now employed by the tech behemoth GLOAT, comes into possession of an unfinished book seemingly authored by the KPG. The manuscript is a riveting revisionist history, connecting famous names and obscure bit players to the KPG’s grand project—everyone from Syngman Rhee and architect-poet Yi Sang to Jack London and Marilyn Monroe. M*A*S*H is in here, too, as are the Moonies and a history of violence extending from the assassination of President McKinley to the Reagan-era downing of a passenger plane that puts the world on the brink of war. From the acclaimed author of Personal Days, Same Bed Different Dreams is a raucously funny feat of imagination and a thrilling meld of history and fiction that pulls readers into another dimension—one in which utopia is possible.
Book Information
- Publisher
- Random House Trade Paperbacks
- Published
- 2024-10-29
- Pages
- 544 pages
- Language
- 英語
- Size
- 13.3 x 2.9 x 20.3 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9780812988321
- ISBN-10
- 0812988329
- Price
- 3601 JPY
- Category
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/Genre Fiction/Satire
PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • A wild, sweeping novel that imagines an alternate secret history of Korea and the traces it leaves on the present—loaded with assassins and mad poets, RPGs and slasher films, pop bands and the perils of social media “Your view of twentieth-century history will be enlarged and altered. . . . A Gravity’s Rainbow for another war, an unfinished war.” —Jonathan Lethem, author of The Fortress of Solitude WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE • ONE OF PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ’S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS ’ CHOICE A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Public Library, Polygon, Kirkus Reviews In 1919, far-flung patriots establish the Korean Provisional Government to protest the Japanese occupation of their country. This government-in-exile proves mostly symbolic, though, and after Japan’s defeat in World War II, the KPG dissolves and civil war erupts, resulting in the tragic North-South split that remains today. But what if the KPG still existed—now working toward a unified Korea, secretly pulling levers to further its aims? Same Bed Different Dreams weaves together three distinct narrative voices with an archive of mysterious images, and twists reality like a kaleidoscope. Korean history, American pop culture, and our tech-fraught lives come together in this extraordinary and unforgettable novel. Soon Sheen, a former writer now employed by the tech behemoth GLOAT, comes into possession of an unfinished book seemingly authored by the KPG. The manuscript is a riveting revisionist history, connecting famous names and obscure bit players to the KPG’s grand project—everyone from Syngman Rhee and architect-poet Yi Sang to Jack London and Marilyn Monroe. M*A*S*H is in here, too, as are the Moonies and a history of violence extending from the assassination of President McKinley to the Reagan-era downing of a passenger plane that puts the world on the brink of war. From the acclaimed author of Personal Days, Same Bed Different Dreams is a raucously funny feat of imagination and a thrilling meld of history and fiction that pulls readers into another dimension—one in which utopia is possible.
Ed Park is the author of the novels Personal Days and Same Bed Different Dreams . He is a founding editor of The Believer, and has worked in newspapers, book publishing, and academia. His writing appears in The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, Harper’s Magazine, The Atlantic, and elsewhere . Born in Buffalo, he lives in Manhattan with his family.
Reviews
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This is a bonkers, brain-smoothing novel about what it's like to believe in conspiracies.
Did you ever know a person for many years and then at some point look at them and think, “When did they lose their mind?” Same Bed Different Dreams is a book that dramatizes one way that might happen in spectacular fashion. If you ever want to experience the simulated feeling of a book trying to gaslight and turn you into a conspiracy theorist with the smoothest of brains this novel achieves that affect — that sensation — with gusto, with style. The sensation is a bit like realizing what a grandmother with dubious feed subscriptions on social media or a nephew glued to the words of unaccredited podcast hosts must feel like as their brain is slowly immersed in a mixture of truth and fiction and questionable causality — except here it’s not grandma, it’s you, the reader. There is an internet meme that is a still photo of a man with frazzled hair and wild eyes gesticulating in front of a conspiracy corkboard of documents red-pinned and rubber-banded together to form a web of connections as if yoked together as part of some grand plot. Much of my experience reading Same Bed Different Dreams was switching between me thinking this book is literally that meme and the disconcerting sensation this book was slowly turning me into that meme while trying to make sense of this novel. For example, learning a character’s last name 74% of the way through the book leads to such a cascade of things clicking together that is super rewarding and satisfying, but then the novel reveals yet another bigger twist, involving of all things a failed multiple-choice test. And it just keeps going. The best technical phrase to describe how the novel ends is “absolutely nuts.” Often you can’t pause to appreciate the vast web this novel’s been weaving – just hang on and enjoy the plunge deeper into the madness. Same Bed Different Dreams is a novel in a novel. The plot is ostensibly about a lapsed fiction writer that works at a ubiquitous technology company that finds himself weirdly compelled when slipped a copy of a unfinished novel about the "true" history of Korea called "Same Bed, Different Dreams" which claims that a cabal of notable notables have been secretly governing Korea as the Korean Provisional Government. There’s also another plot involving a former African American Korean War Air Force pilot, who was a prisoner of war, whose tortured experience informs his attempts at a series of sci-fi novels he writes years later. Yes, it’s about Korea under Japanese imperial rule. It is about the Korean War and the Cold War. It is about the partition and the country divided into north and south. It is about being an Asian-American. It is about Buffalo, New York. It depicts much that is awful & messy about nationalism, about war, about racism, about sexism, about technology, about capitalism and socialism — this book is trying to do and talks about a lot. But what makes it a good book, a great book even, is how it depicts the ways in which trying to connect myriad persons and look for endless causality can lead to madness and can lead to conspiracy. This book fries that unconscious connection-seeking circuit in our brains. This is a book that takes great pleasure in a seemingly endless array of abbreviations and revelations through anagrams. The narrator seems unable to resist an opportunity to turn a misheard word or phrase into a pun or double entendre that also might advance the plot of the book in almost comically significant ways. Some of the puns, especially misheard Korean names are so bad and so important to the plot and story I groaned out loud when I finally “heard” them. To avoid spoilers for the book, think of someone telling you about how talented and handsome a young junk cook was and just prattling on about the adventures of this enigmatic, talented, charismatic, handsome “Junk Cook” before finally revealing to you she meant global K-pop superstar Jung Kook of BTS and wasn’t talking about a bad chef blessed with the gift of dance and a fabulous voice. This book does this to you so often that the feeling when you spot one or when it’s revealed is like being Clockwork-Orange’d by endless bad dad-jokes. Be warned: this book may reduce you to muttering names and words out loud while reading to try and catch plot related puns and you’ll begin to look a bit insane if doing so in public places. What a bonkers novel. I mean this 100% in a good way. I finished Same Bed Different Dreams in two long sittings, including one where I was stuck on a turbulent plane for hours. I recommend trying to buckle-up and burn through the novel to get the maximum “brain-smoothing” effect. I really enjoyed reading Ed Park’s story, but get ready for a weird, wild ride. That dust-jacket blurb doesn’t even come close to how nuts this book is.
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Not a very easy read, but very enjoyable in parts.
The best bits Involved the very interesting History of Korea.
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Migliore lettura dell'anno (anni)
Lettura eccezionale, tra il sogno latente e la storicità irreprensibile. Un mosaico articolatissimo che lentamente diventa un caleidoscopio roteante. Il tutto narrato con un'autorità discreta e un'ironia distaccata, tra Vonnegut e Pynchon. Da non perdere assolutamente.
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Interesting take on Korean History
I enjoyed this book and it’s flipping between characters that are unrelated at first, but then merge into a syncopathic menagerie of stories and relationships. Some parts were lengthy and seemingly unrelated, but stick with it, and you find interesting commonalities. A lot of pop culture references and historical events are well-woven into this fictitious story.
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Revelation of Whose Who Comes Very Late
Modern day Korean history is slowly revealed in Dreams 1-5 but character names shift throughout. The KPG secret society existence over this time period and its impact in the past is enlightening. For me, however, I could not stay engaged in the story line. I was interested in the connection of the modern day timeline with the past, but the connections with the past lives in the dreams was difficult at first. The wandering in and out of the timelines was a disconnect for this reader.