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Happiness Falls by Angie Kim

Literary fiction

Happiness Falls

Repeat author

Angie Kim is back at Book of the Month – other BOTMs include Miracle Creek.

Early Release

This is an early release that's only available to our members—the rest of the world has to wait to read it.

by Angie Kim

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Volume 0
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Quick take

One biracial family grapples with the meaning of happiness and their own lives when their father suddenly goes missing.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, 400

    400+ pages

  • Illustrated icon, Puzzle

    Puzzle

  • Illustrated icon, Cerebral

    Cerebral

  • Illustrated icon, Siblings

    Siblings

Synopsis

“We didn't call the police right away.” Those are the first words of this extraordinary novel about a biracial Korean-American family in Virginia whose lives are upended when their beloved father and husband goes missing.

Mia, the irreverent, hyper analytical twenty-year-old daughter, has an explanation for everything—which is why she isn’t initially concerned when her father and younger brother Eugene don’t return from a walk in a nearby park. They must have lost their phone. Or stopped for an errand somewhere. But by the time Mia’s brother runs through the front door bloody and alone, it becomes clear that the father in this tight-knit family is missing and the only witness is Eugene, who has the rare genetic condition Angelman syndrome and cannot speak.

What follows is both a ticking-clock investigation into the whereabouts of a father and an emotionally rich portrait of a family whose most personal secrets just may be at the heart of his disappearance. Full of shocking twists and fascinating questions of love, language, race, and human connection, Happiness Falls is a mystery, a family drama, and a novel of profound philosophical inquiry.

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Happiness Falls

ONE

Locke, Bach, and K-pop

We didn’t call the police right away. Later, I would blame myself, wonder if things might have turned out differently if I hadn’t shrugged it off, insisting Dad wasn’t missing missing but just delayed, probably still in the woods looking for Eugene, thinking he’d run off somewhere. Mom says it wasn’t my fault, that I was merely being optimistic, but I know better. I don’t believe in optimism. I believe there’s a fine line (if any) between optimism and willful idiocy, so I try to avoid optimism altogether, lest I fall over the line mistakenly.

My twin brother, John, keeps trying to make me feel better, too, saying we couldn’t have known something was wrong because it was such a typical morning, which is an asinine thing to say because why would you assume things can’t go wrong simply because they haven’t yet? Life isn’t geometry; terrible, life-changing moments don’t happen predictably, at the bottom of a linear slope. Tragedies and accidents are tragic and accidental precisely because of their unexpectedness. Besides, labeling anything about our family “typical”—I just have to shake my head. I’m not even thinking about the typical-adjacent stuff like John’s and my boy-girl twin thing, our biracial mix (Korean and white), untraditional parental gender roles (working mom, stay-at-home dad), or different last names (Parson for Dad + Park for Mom = the mashed-up Parkson for us kids)—not common, certainly, but hardly shocking in our area these days. Where we’re indubitably, inherently atypical is with my little brother Eugene’s dual diagnosis: autism and a rare genetic disorder called mosaic Angelman syndrome (AS), which means he can’t talk, has motor difficulties, and—this is what fascinates many people who’ve never heard of AS—has an unusually happy demeanor with frequent smiles and laughter.

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Why I love it

To say that Happiness Falls is a riveting mystery with unexpected twists that keep the pages flying would be absolutely true. It would also be a vast undersell of this brilliant, moving book.

In Angie Kim’s second novel, the greatest mysteries lie hidden in the long-held and fervently believed stories a family tells itself about who they are. Kim offers the reader not only an intricate puzzle about a missing father but a deeply layered study of the innate biases that cloud our ability to see situations clearly. It questions how well any of us understands each other, or even ourselves, and how profoundly wrong our most cherished beliefs can be.

To unravel the mystery of her father’s disappearance, Mia Parkson, a hyper-analytical college student, must examine not only how well she knew her father but her assumptions about her nonspeaking little brother, Eugene, a fourteen year old diagnosed with autism and Angelman syndrome. She—as well as her twin brother and mother—must face the suffering they have inflicted by their ignorance. It is only in opening their hearts to the possibility of their own unintended cruelties that they can discover peace and begin to unravel the even greater mystery of where happiness might reside.

Given our world today, so fractured with fierce certainties, Happiness Falls is a book that expands the heart and offers more angles of view. It is a beautiful and important work.

Member ratings (11,604)

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Literary fiction
View all
Intermezzo
The Book of George
Real Americans
Dirty Diana
Wellness
Margo’s Got Money Troubles
The God of the Woods
Same As It Ever Was
Annie Bot
Bear
Mercury
True Biz
Family Happiness
The Lady Waiting
The Other Valley
Hard by a Great Forest
Good Material
The Bullet Swallower
Happy All the Time
Rental House
Alice Sadie Celine
Let Us Descend
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
Shark Heart
Homeseeking
Transcendent Kingdom
Hello Beautiful
Dominicana
What's Mine and Yours
The Unsettled
Ask Again, Yes
Vladimir
Infinite Country
The Prophets
Normal People
The Verifiers
Salvage the Bones
The Many Daughters of Afong Moy
I Have Some Questions for You
Black Buck
The History of Love
Age of Vice
Paper Names
The Light Pirate
The Secret History
The Kite Runner
Memorial
The Half Moon
Happiness Falls
The Gifted School
The Death of Vivek Oji
The Knockout Queen
Little Monsters
Yerba Buena
Beautiful World, Where Are You
Free Food for Millionaires
A Burning
The Mothers
The Water Dancer
Small Country
The Sympathizer
Fleishman Is in Trouble
Lot
An American Marriage
The Animators
The Mars Room
Exit West
White Fur
Woman No. 17
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
Eat Only When You're Hungry
Rainbirds
A Ladder to the Sky
Golden Child
The Goldfinch
The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P
& Sons
The Association of Small Bombs
Lolly Willowes
All Grown Up
Marlena
Signal Fires
Someday, Maybe
Woman of Light
Marrying the Ketchups
The Shards
Blue Sisters