Author: Soyoung Park

Translated By: Joungmin Lee Comfort

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Publication Date: February 27, 2024

Genre: Young Adult Sci-Fi/Dystopian

Rating: ✈️ ✈️ ✈️ ✈️ .5 out of ✈️ ✈️ ✈️ ✈️ ✈️

Synopsis

In a world of constant winter, only the citizens of the climate-controlled city of Snowglobe can escape the bitter cold—but this perfect society is hiding dark and dangerous secrets within its frozen heart. A groundbreaking Korean novel translated into English for the first time!

“The Hunger Games meets Squid Game in Soyoung Park’s dystopian thriller Snowglobe” –Entertainment Weekly

Enclosed under a vast dome, Snowglobe is the last place on Earth that’s warm. Outside Snowglobe is a frozen wasteland, and every day, citizens face the icy world to get to their jobs at the power plant, where they produce the energy Snowglobe needs. Their only solace comes in the form of twenty- four-hour television programming streamed directly from the domed city.

The residents of Snowglobe have everything: fame, fortune, and above all, safety from the desolation outside their walls. In exchange, their lives are broadcast to the less fortunate outside, who watch eagerly, hoping for the chance to one day become actors themselves.

Chobahm lives for the time she spends watching the shows produced inside Snowglobe. Her favorite? Goh Around, starring Goh Haeri, Snowglobe’s biggest star—and, it turns out, the key to getting Chobahm her dream life.

Because Haeri is dead, and Chobahm has been chosen to take her place. Only, life inside Snowglobe is nothing like what you see on television. Reality is a lie, and truth seems to be forever out of reach.

Translated for the first time into English from the original Korean, Snowglobe is a groundbreaking exploration of personal identity, and the future of the world as we know it. It is the winner of the Changbi X Kakaopage Young Adult Novel Award.

Content Warning: torture, murder, forced work, socioeconomic inequality

Book Links

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | IndieBound

Review

Thank you so much to TBR and Beyond Tours for having me on the book tour for Snowglobe and to the publisher for providing me with an e-arc of the book.

As a longtime fan of dystopian novels and a recent fan of the Snowpiercer movie and tv series, I was really intrigued by the premise of this book as it sounded like something I would enjoy. Thankfully my supposition that I’d enjoy this book turned out to be true. I loved the main character, Chobahm, and following along as she found herself being asked to fill in, and even become, one of her favorite Snowglobe actors who is now dead so that the viewers and society will be able to continue along with what little joy they find through watching Haeri.

I also really enjoyed the fact that when society basically collapsed due to climate change and wars, that the elite of the world enclosed themselves within a glass dome where the temperature was always kept at a comfortable level while those who weren’t lucky enough to be a part of the uber rich and elite live outside the dome and work at power plants producing the energy necessary for their society to continue to exist and to make it so that the human race doesn’t completely die out from the unbearably cold temperatures.

As much as I loved Chobahm and the world she finds herself being thrust into, it was the underlying mystery that exists at the core of every dystopian that really drew me in and made it so that I had a hard time putting the book aside. Knowing that there had to be some type of corruption behind the scenes, I needed to know what it was and how it all came about and applied to Chobahm and the cover up of Haeri’s death. I will say that when I finally learned the truth about Haeri and Chobahm, I was taken by surprise not only at just how involved the plan was, but at the full truth of the situation as I didn’t see the whole truth of the matter coming.

I’m really happy that I read this and I cannot wait for the conclusion in this duology to come out and be translated into English so that I can read it. It is also my hope that the author will write more books and that they’ll be translated too as I really enjoyed Snowglobe and Park’s storytelling.

Playlist

This is a book inspired playlist I put together of songs that made me think of the story and themes as I was reading. Enjoy!

About the Author

Soyoung Park majored in communication and media at university. She is a winner of the Original Story Award and the Changbi X Kakaopage Young Adult Novel Award. She is the author of the Snowglobe duology.