Top Shelf Reads - Book Discussion

Registration Required

This program is being offered remotely via Zoom. The Zoom link will be included in the registration confirmation email and reminder email sent 48 hours before the event.

This month we will be discussing If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha. Copies of the book are available for check out at the Information Desk at both FCL locations.

A glitteringly dark and unsettling debut novel set in the drinking dens and beauty salons of South Korea

If I Had Your Face plunges us into the mesmerizing world of contemporary Seoul - a place where extreme plastic surgery is as routine as getting a haircut, where women compete for spots in secret 'room salons' to entertain wealthy businessmen after hours, where K-Pop stars are the object of all-consuming obsession, and ruthless social hierarchies dictate your every move.

Navigating this cut-throat city are four young women balancing on the razor-edge of survival: Kyuri, an exquisitely beautiful woman whose hard-won status at an exclusive 'room salon' is threatened by an impulsive mistake with a client; her flatmate Miho, an orphan who wins a scholarship to a prestigious art school in New York, where her life becomes tragically enmeshed with the super-wealthy offspring of the Korean elite; Wonna, their neighbor, pregnant with a child that she and her husband have no idea how they will afford to raise in a fiercely competitive economy; and Ara, a hair stylist living down the hall, whose infatuation with a fresh-faced K-Pop star drives her to violent extremes.