Flashlight

SAM WORLEY, VULTURE

"Prickly, gorgeous ... There are no moments of total illumination here, just a beam shining briefly on a target before scanning restlessly onward ... One thing that hasn't changed is what an outlandishly talented writer Choi is, her prose possessing an iron confidence in its own beauty. She favors complex, lightly punctuated sentences whose payoff comes late ... Choi is a writer who can be trusted to have a plan, and she sews the narrative up with a conclusion that's almost impossibly heartbreaking — about which the less said the better. Some things you can see coming from miles away. But life, we're reminded, retains its ability to surprise."