Writer
Jasmine Liu is a writer and journalist from the San Francisco Bay Area who comments on literature in translation, contemporary art, classical music, and more. More of her work is available at her website.
Jasmine Liu
“If I could not be with my mother, I would be her": A Review of Michelle Zauner’s memoir Crying in H Mart
Jasmine Liu - June 14, 2021
An elegy that attempts to capture the life a mother led
I was skeptical when I first heard that Michelle Zauner, popularly known as the recording artist Japanese Breakfast, was writing a memoir. Songs from Soft Sounds from Another Planet, her 2017 album, made regular appearances on Spotify playlists in my sophomore year of college. In part, I was skeptical because I hated that sophomoric version of myself. In equal parts, I felt anticipatory dread reading a musician’s foray into memoir-writing.