March 31, 2026
Inheritance, by Jane Park
Jane Park’s debut novel is the compelling story of a Korean immigrant family arriving in Alberta in the 1980s, how their Canadian dreams measure up to reality, and how the family’s history continues to influence their present, even as so much of the past remains unspoken. The story is narrated by the youngest daughter, Anne, who has a successful career as a lawyer in New York City, but returns to her mother and brother in Edmonton after her father dies. The story moves between the present day, as Anne takes stock of her job, her life, and her relationship, and her family’s past, including the difficult period where her parents struggled to eke out a living running a small town grocery store, a period that ended with a horrific act of violence that would shape the trajectory of everything that happens after that.
Some aspects of Jane’s character in the present day seem underdeveloped, although you could make a case for this being a result of everything that’s happened to her and her family rather than a literary problem. The weaving of the different time periods in among her story makes for rich and effective storytelling, however, and there is real nuance as Park considers different class and social dynamics within Korean communities, and within the small town community the family finds itself within as well, including members of a nearby Indigenous nation. Within each individual character too, there is a most human blend of light and dark, good and evil, and the notion of inheritance is considered from a variety of interesting angles, resulting in a read that’s rich and absorbing.
