88 books like A Merry Little Meet Cute

When I was a kid growing up in Canada, many of my classmates didn’t know about Korea. They’d guess I was Chinese or Japanese, and when I’d tell them I’m Korean, they’d say, “What’s that?” Things have changed since then and now Korea is well-known all around the world, and that’s reflected in our bookshelves too. I’m delighted to see that there are more books out there today that reflect my culture and heritage, in a wide range of genres, age groups, and settings! Speaking of setting, here are some young adult novels that take place in South Korea that I enjoyed, and I hope you will too.

I’ve had a love-hate relationship with pop music since I was a kid singing Britney Spear’s “Lucky” with my friends. Eventually, I evolved into a punk-ass cynical teenager who disavowed my love of pop, but the fascination remained. In college, I started a pop star romance that would–many, many years later–become my debut book Love in the Liner Notes. In the process, I read an obsessively large number of books touching on music, celebrities, musicians, and the entertainment industry. I hope you enjoy a selection of my favorites, mostly romances (what can I say, I have a type) that brought me the kind of joy only a pop star can. 

I’ve had a love-hate relationship with pop music since I was a kid singing Britney Spear’s “Lucky” with my friends. Eventually, I evolved into a punk-ass cynical teenager who disavowed my love of pop, but the fascination remained. In college, I started a pop star romance that would–many, many years later–become my debut book Love in the Liner Notes. In the process, I read an obsessively large number of books touching on music, celebrities, musicians, and the entertainment industry. I hope you enjoy a selection of my favorites, mostly romances (what can I say, I have a type) that brought me the kind of joy only a pop star can. 

I’ve had a love-hate relationship with pop music since I was a kid singing Britney Spear’s “Lucky” with my friends. Eventually, I evolved into a punk-ass cynical teenager who disavowed my love of pop, but the fascination remained. In college, I started a pop star romance that would–many, many years later–become my debut book Love in the Liner Notes. In the process, I read an obsessively large number of books touching on music, celebrities, musicians, and the entertainment industry. I hope you enjoy a selection of my favorites, mostly romances (what can I say, I have a type) that brought me the kind of joy only a pop star can. 

Let me tell you a little about myself. I was born in Dublin, and being the daughter of a diplomat afforded me to experience different cultures. Since childhood my fascination with the unknown caused me to gravitate towards stories related to hauntings. I shared this interest with my maternal grandparents, who contributed to my education by telling me ghost stories (some true whilst others are fictional). Tales of haunted castles were my favorite, which is reflected in my book. In later life, my own experiences with the paranormal cemented the notion of the unexplained and the thin veil between us and those departed.

I’m an emeritus professor of psychology (University of Washington) who has long been intrigued by the mistakes that people have made throughout history. I’ve long been struck by Oppenheimer’s observation, immediately after the Trinity explosion, that “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” This led me to look into the wide array of mistakes, from the mythic, literary, athletic, business, political, medical, and military. In writing OOPS!, I let myself go in a way that I’ve never before, writing with a critical and wise-ass style that isn’t strictly academic, but is factually accurate and, frankly, was a lot of fun!

I am a British writer and avid reader of a wide range of genres who’d harbored a life-long ambition to be an author. It wasn’t until I became addicted to seductive romance that I found my own writing flow. I love books that have the power to transport you. Indulging in an adult ideal for a few minutes (or hours) in a day, when your body reacts viscerally to the words on a page, makes you swoon, your cheeks flush and your heart race is my reading and writing heaven. I hope you will experience the same delicious escapism in my book choices as I have. 

I was born in 1947, in the first wave of the baby boom, and was part of the first generation to grow up immersed in television, movies, and popular music. I have always felt the force of pop culture in my life.  But it was only at a certain point that it became something that I felt I could write about and be taken seriously. Writers like Pauline Kael made it possible for me because they obviously adored popular culture but they neither puffed it up nor dumbed it down. They wrote about it with intelligence, honesty, and curiosity and also as a barometer of where people were at and where society was going. That’s what I’ve aimed at in my own writing, from my books on the male and female body to those on politics and the media to my most recent exploration of the impact of television on our lives.

I am an art school dropout and recovering rock critic who, since 1981, has published a dozen books on Australian music and popular culture, plus worked extensively in television and as a freelance journalist. I'm too old to be called an enfant terrible, but with the way I still seem to be able to court controversy, I must remain some sort of loose cannon! Sydney’s Sun-Herald has called me "our best chronicler of Australian grass-roots culture," and that’s a tag I’m flattered by but which does get at what I’ve always been interested in. I consider myself a historian who finds resonances where most don’t even bother to look, in our own backyard, yesterday, and the fact that so much of my backlist including Inner City Sound, Highway to Hell, Buried Country, Golden Miles, History is Made at Night, and Stranded are still in print, I take as vindication I’m on the right track…

I’m a romance novelist who writes about otherwise smart people who deal badly with their feelings. Love, sorrow, jealousy, anger, hopelessness, and grief make appearances in my books because I write in a genre that centers the emotional lives of its characters. When I’m not wreaking havoc on fictional people, I take long walks and eavesdrop on conversations. I’m a recent transplant to Toronto, Canada, after having lived in New York City for more than 20 years.