Review of The God and the Gumiho by Sophie Kim

*The God and the Gumiho* by Sophie Kim (2024). Published by Del Rey.

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

Running a book blog and reading almost two hundred books a year (I’ve done this almost every year of my life—it’s been a fascinating trend, even when I’ve been too busy to exist outside of life and work), I tend to know what kind of books I like. I’m also very intentional in analyzing the trends of what I’m reading, as I’m genuinely committed to diversifying the books I pick up and see new perspectives.

That said, I almost never pick up fantasy books unless they catch my attention specifically. It was someone I follow’s Instagram post (I’m so sad I didn’t save it and can’t credit them—but it was an AAPI book creator) that informed me of the existence of The God and the Gumiho, so I looked it up after I saw it on social media.

The synopsis is what sold me on requesting a copy of it and its sequel immediately. I love Korean mythology so much and I want to learn more about it. I did my master’s degree in Korean women’s literature during the colonial and postcolonial periods, and I lived in Busan and Seoul twice on language intensives through the U.S. government, so I know the basics, but I’m always learning more.

Korean literature fascinates me, but I never claim to be an expert in anything. I’m also not Korean and defer to native Koreans and scholars when it comes to the culture and whatnot. But when I find books like these, they really excite me in a way that pushes my intellectual boundaries as well, even if it’s marketed as a young adult book.

Anyways: I read this entire book in one sitting. It wasn’t too difficult to read, and I was quite invested in it.

Let’s get into the review before I ramble too much!

An infamous gumiho befriends a fallen god in order to keep her identity a secret—but it backfires in so many different ways.

Our main character in this novel is Kim Hani, who has been alive for thousands of years. Back in the day, before there were tighter regulations on the gumiho and mythical creatures, she used to go wild with eating men’s livers and killing them. Her last big stunt was in the late 1800s, which the humans thought was Jack the Ripper. Turns out it was her and Jack the Ripper (who she then killed).

Anyways, since then, Hani has been laying low and hides her famous twin daggers inside of her underwear drawer. These days she works at a cafe with another gumiho, but then she gets on the dark side of the fallen trickster god Seokga. Many years prior his brother, who runs the heavens, kicked him out and stripped him of his godly powers after he attempted to have a coup and seize power.

These days he just works as a glorified police officer tracking down unruly demons. When Hani spills coffee down all of his shirt one day, much to the horror of her coworker, they both begin an intricate dance. Seokga has a new preoccupation though to deal with: a demon of darkness has escaped the Underworld, and he’s wreaking havoc on the humans and mythical creatures alike.

Things become even more of a headache for Seokga when he learns the Scarlet Fox might be back. Turns out Hani, after telling her coworker how good livers tasted, decided to kill some dumb college guys coming onto her and then feed her coworker their livers. It was immediately pegged as a crime done by the Scarlet Fox.

So to save her own hide, Hani decides to apply for a position working as Seokga’s assistant. As they start investigating both crimes together, there’s some chemistry between the two, but not before things hit the fan in so many different ways.

First of all: when Seokga’s brother asks to meet, he tells Seokga that if he catches the demon and the Scarlet Fox, he can become a god again. As Hani and Seokga become closer, and he’s less standoffish to him, she comes to learn this fact she has to make some decisions on her own terms.

This is a novel packed with Korean mythology and lore, so if you’re not familiar with it and want to be immersed, I suggest some light reading on the basics. I already knew the basics to an extent, but there were creatures and concepts I hadn’t encountered before and was interested to learn about after reading this book. Maybe keep a phone, notebook, or computer handy for research after?

Overall Thoughts

I did really enjoy this book, and as I mentioned before, I was immersed in it to the point where I finished it in an entire sitting. Not every book I pick up I finish in one sitting—it’s usually only the shorter ones, or books that I really find myself wanting to get through over the course of an evening.

I think this book’s strengths lie in the mystery of what’s happening, as there’s quite a bit of tension there, and in the world building combined with the mythology. I did really like the world and its characters, and I was rooting for them throughout the course of the novel.

However, the writing with the romance came off a bit weak and sudden for me. I likened it to the Korean drama Tale of the Nine Tailed, which had such a good start, but the romance writing in that was top-tier either. We have this rich, lush world, but then the romance comes across as a bit forced to me, so I didn’t find the ending as satisfying of an emotional payoff as it would’ve been if I was invested in these characters.

All of this is to say: this is a solid novel with its flaws. Pick it up from your local library or indie bookstore if you’re interested—it’s definitely worth giving a chance at least once!

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