Dear Mr. Nice Guard Man: Love Letters to the People of South Korea

COMPELLED BY THE GLOBAL RECESSION that began in 2007, Ruth M. Youn and her husband left behind their country and culture in the United States to live in South Korea, working as elementary school English teachers from 2009 to 2014. Through a series of letters written to the people who shaped her experience in Seoul—among them, a neighborhood yogurt vendor, owners of a favorite restaurant, the elderly man guarding her apartment building, and many more—she draws us into a story that reveals the challenges of cultural adjustment, her struggle with depression and becoming a mother for the first time. Sharing the delights—and sometimes deep disappointments—of life as a foreigner, she invites us to discover the common yearning of the human experience—a desire for meaningful connection, no matter where we live.