Simple Heart: A Novel
Cho Haejin
Jan 2026 · Penguin Random House Audio · Narrated by Jean Yoon
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5 hr 38 min
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“Simple Heart will make you cry. Its emotion is stunning and pure.” —The Globe and Mail
Before she was named Nana by the French couple who adopted her as a child, she was Esther Pak, a girl growing up in a Korean orphanage. And before she was Esther Pak, she was Munju, a small child abandoned on the railway tracks in Seoul.
Nana has no memories of the first three or four years of her life, no family records detailing the personal information of her parents, no birth certificate or any medical records from the hospital where she was born. She was abandoned on the railway tracks at a station in Seoul, where a train conductor saved her life and took her in for a year, before bringing her to an orphanage.
Adopted by a French couple, she is now a playwright in Paris. The day she finds out she is pregnant with her first child, she receives an email from Seoyeong, a Korean filmmaker who wishes to make a documentary about her life. Nana accepts the offer, hoping to reconcile with her past as she prepares to become a mother. She travels to Seoul stays at the filmmaker’s apartment. One night, during a power outage, Nana ventures to Bokhee’s Kitchen, the restaurant on the ground floor, and befriends the woman who runs it. Soon, they develop a strong bond. But while Nana moves through Seoul, visiting the orphanage and the train station where she was abandoned thirty-five years ago, the woman everyone calls Bokhee has a stroke and is hospitalized—and her real name and past come to light.
Simple Heart is a poignant and tender novel that delves into the lives of women from postwar to present, the bonds of love between women and children, and the difficult choices mothers have to make.
Before she was named Nana by the French couple who adopted her as a child, she was Esther Pak, a girl growing up in a Korean orphanage. And before she was Esther Pak, she was Munju, a small child abandoned on the railway tracks in Seoul.
Nana has no memories of the first three or four years of her life, no family records detailing the personal information of her parents, no birth certificate or any medical records from the hospital where she was born. She was abandoned on the railway tracks at a station in Seoul, where a train conductor saved her life and took her in for a year, before bringing her to an orphanage.
Adopted by a French couple, she is now a playwright in Paris. The day she finds out she is pregnant with her first child, she receives an email from Seoyeong, a Korean filmmaker who wishes to make a documentary about her life. Nana accepts the offer, hoping to reconcile with her past as she prepares to become a mother. She travels to Seoul stays at the filmmaker’s apartment. One night, during a power outage, Nana ventures to Bokhee’s Kitchen, the restaurant on the ground floor, and befriends the woman who runs it. Soon, they develop a strong bond. But while Nana moves through Seoul, visiting the orphanage and the train station where she was abandoned thirty-five years ago, the woman everyone calls Bokhee has a stroke and is hospitalized—and her real name and past come to light.
Simple Heart is a poignant and tender novel that delves into the lives of women from postwar to present, the bonds of love between women and children, and the difficult choices mothers have to make.
“Simple Heart will make you cry. Its emotion is stunning and pure.” —The Globe and Mail
Before she was named Nana by the French couple who adopted her as a child, she was Esther Pak, a girl growing up in a Korean orphanage. And before she was Esther Pak, she was Munju, a small child abandoned on...
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About the author
CHO HAEJIN was born in Seoul, South Korea, in 1976. After earning a master’s degree in Korean literature, she began her writing career in 2004 with the literary magazine Munye Joongang. Since then, her work has been recognized as testament to the existence and lives of those on the margins of Korean society and those forgotten by history, and has won several prominent literary awards in Korea, including the Shin Dong-yup Literary Award, Young Writer’s Award, Lee Hyo-seok Literary Award, Hyungpyeong Literary Award, and Dong-in Literary Award. Simple Heart was the winner of both the Daesan Literary Award, a leading literary award in Korea, and the Kim Man-jung Literary Award, and has been published in eight countries. Her other novels include I Met Loh Kiwan, which was adapted to film under the title My Name is Loh Kiwan and released on Netflix in 2024.
JAMIE CHANG is an award-winning literary translator. Her translation of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 was longlisted for the 2020 National Book Awards in Translated Literature. She is the recipient of the Daesan Foundation Translation Grant and a three-time recipient of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea Grant. She lives in Nova Scotia, Canada.
JAMIE CHANG is an award-winning literary translator. Her translation of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 was longlisted for the 2020 National Book Awards in Translated Literature. She is the recipient of the Daesan Foundation Translation Grant and a three-time recipient of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea Grant. She lives in Nova Scotia, Canada.
CHO HAEJIN was born in Seoul, South Korea, in 1976. After earning a master’s degree in Korean literature, she began her writing career in 2004 with the literary magazine Munye Joongang. Since then, her work has been recognized as testament to the existence and lives of those on the margins of Kor...
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