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Shanna Tan

Biography

Shanna Tan

Shanna Tan is a literary translator based in sunny Singapore, translating from Korean, Chinese and Japanese. She spends her time with languages --- reading, teaching, translating and writing. Elsewhere on the internet, she writes about self-studying foreign languages and her love of books. She lives in Singapore.

Shanna Tan

Books by Shanna Tan

written by Song Yu-jeong, translated by Shanna Tan - Fiction, Magical Realism

If you're lost or grieving, you'll find The Memory Bookshop, where the shelves are endless; the books are strangely familiar; and memories are bound in pages. Jiwon’s life has been slowly disintegrating since her mother died. Until one day, caught by a sudden downpour, she stumbles into a mysterious bookstore. Inside, she is met by Manager K and offered no explanation, only a mysterious hourglass and a rare opportunity: to travel back to three chapters of her life. But returning to the past isn't without risk. In exchange, Jiwon must give up time in her future. As she wanders between the shelves, the bookshop humming with memories and regrets, she must ask herself: Can the past truly be rewritten? Or does the real magic lie in the life she's yet to live?

written by Hwang Bo-reum, translated by Shanna Tan - Essays, Memoir, Nonfiction

Why do we read? What is it that we hope to take away from the intimate, personal experience of reading for pleasure? How often do we ask these profound, expansive questions of ourselves and of our relationship to the joy of reading? In each of the essays in EVERY DAY I READ, Hwang Bo-reum contemplates what living a life immersed in reading means. She goes beyond the usual questions of what to read and how often, exploring the relationship between reading and writing, when to turn to a bestseller vs. browse the corners of a bookstore, the value of reading outside of your favorite genre, falling in love with book characters, and more.

written by Hwang Bo-reum, translated by Shanna Tan - Fiction

Yeongju is burned out. She did everything she was supposed to: go to school, marry a decent man, get a respectable job. Then it all fell apart. In a leap of faith, Yeongju abandons her old life, quits her high-flying career, and follows her dream. She opens a bookshop. In a quaint neighborhood in Seoul, surrounded by books, Yeongju and her customers take refuge. From the lonely barista to the unhappily married coffee roaster --- and the writer who sees something special in Yeongju --- they all have disappointments in their past. The Hyunam-dong Bookshop becomes the place where they all learn how to truly live.