Tailbone - by Che Yeun (Hardcover)

About the Book

"An unforgettable debut novel, indelible, knowing, powerful, consuming. This marks the start of a major career." --Alexander Chee, author of How To Write an Autobiographical Novel

A fierce and gorgeous debut novel about a teenager who runs away from her abusive home to live in a boarding house for single women as a global financial crash threatens the people of Seoul.

Book Synopsis

"An unforgettable debut novel, indelible, knowing, powerful, consuming. This marks the start of a major career." --Alexander Chee, author of How To Write an Autobiographical Novel

A fierce and gorgeous debut novel about a teenager who runs away from her abusive home to live in a boarding house for single women as a global financial crash threatens the people of Seoul.

Set in Seoul in 2008, Tailbone follows the story of an unnamed teenage girl who, after years of struggling with her alcoholic father's abuse, and what she sees as her mother's cowardice, decides to run away. At a boarding house for single women, the narrator is pulled into the orbit of one of the other girls living there: an older girl named Juju, whose beauty and hardscrabble determination greatly impress the narrator.

But when a global financial crisis reaches Korea, fears of a wider economic collapse bring the city to a standstill. Everything the girls have come to rely on for survival-mainly, the patronage of wealthy men-is put at risk. Everyone begins to struggle, especially Juju, who has long been dependent on one particular benefactor, a man who is all too aware of his power over her. As businesses close and winter sets in, the narrator is forced to reckon with not only her deepening fear for Juju's future, but also her own uncertain path. Will she stay on the run or go back home to her heartbroken mother? In a city where everything rots from greed and desperation, what can a helpless woman like Juju teach her about survival? Will their hope for each other ignite courage or destruction?

A poignant tale about survival, the impact of colonial and familial violence, class, privilege, and womanhood, Tailbone is a powerful and thrilling novel from a blazing new talent.

Review Quotes

"This is poised to be a breakout debut novel from a writer whose short fiction has garnered praise and attention...[A] story of friendship, identity, and soul-searching that stays with you long after the last page." --S. Zainab Williams, BookRiot

"An unforgettable novel. When a coming-of-age story can surprise me, I know a writer has done their job. Yeun takes the darkest moments and finds hope in them." --Adam Vitcavage, Debutiful "Most Anticipated Debuts of 2026"

"The powerful first novel from Yeun, set in South Korea, follows a teenage girl who flees her abusive home and moves to a boarding home, where she befriends another girl whose relationship with her benefactor is threatened by the 2008 financial crisis." --Michael Schaub, Orange County Register

"With this story of how we betray and are betrayed, by others but especially by ourselves, Che Yeun has given us an unforgettable debut novel, indelible, knowing, powerful, consuming. This marks the start of a major career." --Alexander Chee, author of HOW TO WRITE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOVEL

"A gripping coming of age tale as savage as it is astounding, Tailbone seduces one first with voice, then swells and electrifies from within the storied walls of the Seoul boarding house in which anything is possible. Tailbone introduces Che Yeun as one of the absolute greats, an extraordinary stylist and singular storyteller of our time." --T Kira Madden, author of WHIDBEY and LONG LIVE THE TRIBE OF FATHERLESS GIRLS

"With sharp and arresting prose, Che Yeun's Tailbone fearlessly examines a South Korea on the brink of economic collapse. A haunting, unforgettable story about survival in all its forms." --Jenny Tinghui Zhang, author of FOUR TREASURES OF THE SKY and SUPERFAN

"Che Yeun's debut novel marks the arrival of a bold, assured voice. Unflinching and devastating, Tailbone is a novel best read in one sitting so that it can be immediately reread. Rich in metaphor and social realism, Yeun's Seoul-set tale is also relentlessly propulsive. This story of a young woman's personal awakening is destined to become a literary classic." --Maurice Carlos Ruffin, author of THE AMERICAN DAUGHTERS and WE CAST A SHADOW

"In terse yet poignant prose, Che Yeun's debut takes an unflinching look at what it means for a teenage girl to come of age in a society wracked by economic instability, consumerism, and desperation. A story of friendship and resilience, Tailbone is at once gritty and tender - a trim novel that nevertheless packs an emotional weight" --Karissa Chen, author of HOMESEEKING

"An absolutely astonishing debut, a haunting portrait of young lives on the edge of ruin. Che Yeun writes as if her heart were on fire. Her heroine, a teen runaway, leads us into the rotting heart of Seoul, a city crashing into financial ruin. But her story is universal. It is a dark and tender fairytale about women enslaved by the violent needs of men who are, in turn, enslaved by the humiliations of capitalism. Tailbone is one of those books I devoured, and that devoured me. It is a small, fierce masterpiece." --Steve Almond, author of ALL THE SECRETS OF THE WORLD

"A searing debut by an exceptional writer. Every image here sizzles, every sentence captures a young woman's run for escape with startling precision and vividness. I'm haunted by what it reveals about violence and power." --Bruna Dantas Lobato, author of BLUE LIGHT HOURS

"Che Yeun lays out the ways admiration can calcify and crack, the tragedy of growing up too fast against a background of intense national struggle and change, and the poignant loss of youth that only some of us get to grieve. A brutal, beautiful debut." --Jemimah Wei, author of THE ORIGINAL DAUGHTER

"Gritty and unflinching, Che Yeun's Tailbone is a mesmerizing portrayal of the precarity and peril of modern Seoul. The narrator, a teenage runaway, forges a friendship with the fiery Juju, who teaches her how to survive amid economic and social tumult. Yet escape remains elusive. A haunting debut" --Vanessa Hua, author of FORBIDDEN CITY

"A fierce debut set in Seoul in 2008 following an unnamed teenage girl escaping an abusive home to live in a women's boarding house during the global financial crisis." --Lucy Yu, Electric Literature

"A tense, chilling portrait of a teenager's perilous journey into unprepared independence...Yeun writes with glaring clarity, exposing a tortuous cycle of twisted hope and bleak reality, exacerbated by a sweeping financial downturn that further threatens the girls' already tenuous existence. Societal--and personal--judgment stifles these girls, already openly commodified, but Yeun hauntingly commits to amplifying their humanity, as they confess uncertainty, fight invisibility, savor fleeting moments of kindness and empathy." --Shelf Awareness

"Che Yeun's stunning debut is a coming-of-age tale set in Seoul during the 2008 global financial
crisis...Readers will be riveted by this sharp, unflinching commentary on class, gender, privilege, and resilience." --Booklist (starred review)

"Yeun offers a no-holds-barred view into her narrator's hardscrabble life, from her family home where "the boil of our underwear warmed our rooms," to the ways in which men's rage and shame over their financial failure manifest into violence against women. This is incandescent." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

About the Author

Che Yeun's short fiction can be found in Granta, AGNI, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Kenyon Review Online, and elsewhere. Her work has received grants from Hedgebrook, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, and the David T.K. Wong Fellowship. After completing her PhD in History of Science at Harvard University, she is currently a professor of History of Science & Technology at Texas A&M University. She was born in Seoul, Korea.