“Switching between six characters undergoing IVF—a journalist, a police officer, a vet, a lawyer, and two housewives—this thought-provoking novel explores the social pressure and emotional strain put on women struggling to conceive.”—The Millions, Most Anticipated Books of Summer 2026
“The stories of the women in Hello Baby sing like a Greek chorus about the pain of longing, of unknown futures, and of relentless hope. As much a study of the yearning and process of having a baby through IVF, this novel illuminates the essentiality of female friendship and mutual support through it all. I loved it.”—Anna Hogeland, author of The Long Answer
“Hello Baby circles the hunger to meet one’s child, who, before birth, is as mythical as any unicorn. In the secret society of women in the IVF clinic, a tapestry of desire and hope and loss and jealousy emerges. This novel is striking in its honesty and its precision. For the women here, to take the risk of imagining a child is to irrevocably change the future, no matter the outcome of treatment. This is an intimate, searing story.”—Ramona Ausubel, author of The Last Animal
“Six women bonded in an IVF group chat in Kim’s ultra-contemporary South Korea give voice to their frustrations, vulnerabilities, and strength navigating twenty-first century infertility. In crystalline prose, Kim balances the yearning for motherhood with the exasperating, almost tragicomic weight of overbearing in-laws and checked-out husbands who can’t distinguish one medical procedure from another. What remains from their efforts is a steely love and loyalty for each other, even when one woman’s victory is not as it seems.”—Yoojin Grace Wuertz, author of Everything Belongs to Us
“What a humane, sometimes funny, and always illuminating exploration of the hopeful, painful pursuit of pregnancy and birth that so many people undertake around the world every day. Every character is beautifully drawn; every story gripping and utterly real. This is an important work of art and witness.”—Lydia Kiesling, author of Mobility
“The women in Kim’s wrenching novel are drawn together by their yearning for and thus-far inability to have a baby . . . Each of the women’s backstories, achingly translated by [Sora] Kim-Russell, consider what being a woman, wife/partner, daughter-in-law, and someday-mother means in a country with the world’s lowest birth rate . . . a multilayered story filled with pain and tears and longing.”—Booklist, starred review
“Astute . . . Kim conveys the difficult and sometimes baffling realities of infertility with a mix of levity and blunt honesty. This resonates.”—Publishers Weekly
