Eyes Are the Best Part

The 'good for Her' Novel Crawling under Readers' Skin

by Monika Kim

288 pages

English language

Published 2024 by Octopus Publishing Group.

ISBN:: 978-1-914240-86-7

“Violent, smart, gruesome and wildly original, this novel pulls readers into a horrific world of murder and cannibalism while also critiquing misogyny, exploring Asian fetishization and stereotypes, sharing what it’s like to navigate two cultures and telling a touching story of a family in turmoil.” — New York Times Book Review

Crying in H-Mart meets My Sister, the Serial Killer in this brilliantly subversive, feminist psychological horror novel about the making of a female serial killer from a Korean-American perspective.

Ji-won’s life tumbles into disarray in the wake of her Appa’s extramarital affair and subsequent departure. Her mother, distraught. Her younger sister, hurt and confused. Her college freshman grades, failing. Her dreams, horrifying . . . yet enticing.

In them, Ji-won walks through bloody rooms full of eyes. Succulent blue eyes. Mouthwatering blue eyes. Eyes the same shape and shade as George’s, who is Umma’s obnoxious …

In them, Ji-won walks through bloody rooms full of eyes. Succulent blue eyes. Mouthwatering blue eyes. Eyes the same shape and shade as George’s, who is Umma’s obnoxious new boyfriend. He brags about his puffed-up consulting job, ogles Asian waitresses while dining out, and acts condescendingly toward Ji-won and her sister, as if he deserves all of Umma’s fawning adoration. But George doesn’t deserve anything from her family. Ji-won will make sure of that.

No matter how many victims accumulate around her campus or how many people she must deceive and manipulate, Ji-won’s hunger and her rage deserve to be sated.

"I was enticed from the first line and entertained throughout. The Eyes Are the Best Part is a quirky, engaging read."—Oyinkan Brainthwaite, author of My Sister, the Serial Killer

3 editions

73pctGeek reviewed Eyes Are the Best Part by Monika Kim

Skip if eyes squick you out

3 stars

Ji-won's life is falling apart. Friends, school, family, all fragmenting, dissolving. And then one day her mother meets George. Ji-won hates George. With a passion.

I quite enjoyed most of this, the main exception being the dreams. I'm not a fan of dream sequences, ever. The writing was engaging, the story interesting, and it ended with a mostly satisfactory conclusion. Some parts were a little over-the-top, some threads are left a little unfinished, but all in all an enjoyable read. Do NOT read if ommetaphobic. Do read for female rage, and comeuppances.

Ji-won's life is falling apart. Friends, school, family, all fragmenting, dissolving. And then one day her mother meets George. Ji-won hates George. With a passion.

chris b reviewed Eyes Are the Best Part by Monika Kim

The Eyes are the Best Part

4 stars

Enjoyable! Hard not to draw parallels to Boy Parts (which from my understanding is also difficult to separate from American Psycho, a book I haven't read), but I think the... antagonists, I guess, in Eyes are a little more realized, and Ji-Won's actions a little more justified. All the same, I'm not sure this will stick with me quite as much