Wish Soup: A Celebration of Seollal
Written by Junghwa Park
Illustrated by Junghwa Park
Published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Sohee’s favorite part of Seollal is tteokguk—the special Korean rice cake soup traditionally only enjoyed on New Year’s Day. Each bowl is said to make the person who eats it one year older. This year, Sohee wants to eat as many bowls as she can to finally be an eonni, or “big girl,” to her younger siblings and cousins. Before Sohee can even get to her first bowl, though, she’s interrupted by a series of holiday-related chores, leaving plenty of opportunity for her mischievous younger sister Somi to eat not only Sohee’s tteokguk, but their whole family’s! Despite this outrageously silly setback, Sohee eventually learns that being a big girl is more than just how many bowls of tteokguk you eat.
This funny story of a child’s journey to discover what it really means to be a big girl explores the traditions of Korean Lunar New Year and the value of family and helpfulness.
Primary ISBN: 9780316457361
Publication Date: December 2023
Available As: Hardcover
Picture Book, Age 04 or older
Community Represented: Korean/Korean American
Themes: Celebrations, Celebrations: Lunar New Year, Cultural Empowerment, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Celebrations & Traditions, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Clothing, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Family, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Food, Family Relationship: Parents, Family Relationship: Siblings, Genre: Humor, Identity: Multilingual, Multilingual: Korean Featured Words, Own Voices/Lived Experience
Setting: Unspecified
Character's Place in the Immigration Journey: Unknown Arrival
Book Creator(s) Connection to the Community Represented: Own Voices/Lived Experience
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