One Left: A Novel

"An estimated 200,000 Korean girls were forced into sexual servitude for the Japanese military forces during World War II, and only 20,000 of these women are thought to have survived and made it back to Korea after the war. Two hundred and thirty-eight self-declared comfort women have come forward to make their background public, and as of October 2017, only 37 among these women were still alive; their average age was 91. One Left, published in Korea in 2016, is the first Korean novel devoted exclusively to the subject of comfort women. The book tells the story of a woman from the day she was taken from her home village by the Japanese and forced into a life as a sex slave at a "comfort station" in Manchuria. Finding her way back to Korea after the war, she hides her past even from close family members, her feelings constantly colored by shame and nightmares. She never publicly reveals her past, but as the last self-reported comfort woman lies on her deathbed, the protagonist is driven to meet this woman and tell her that there will still be "one left" after her passing. The novel is well-grounded and thoroughly researched, and it includes over 300 endnotes crediting the sources of many of the details mentioned by the protagonist as she recounts her memories of the comfort station in Manchuria"--