2025 Booker Longlist: Flashlight by Susan Choi

Next up for our panel is Susan Choi’s Flashlight. All five panelists read this book and we were pretty split in our reviews. Which reviewer do you side with?

Susan Choi is the acclaimed author of several genre-defying novels, including Trust Exercise, winner of the 2019 National Book Award. Her novels have been recognized for their psychological depth and narrative daring. A graduate of Yale and Cornell, she teaches fiction writing at Johns Hopkins University and lives in Brooklyn. Flashlight is her 6th novel.

Book Synopsis from Booker website: One evening, 10-year-old Louisa and her father take a walk out on the breakwater. They are spending the summer in a coastal Japanese town while her father Serk, a Korean émigré, completes an academic secondment from his American university. When Louisa wakes hours later, she has washed up on the beach and her father is missing, probably drowned. 

The disappearance of Louisa’s father shatters their small family unit. As Louisa and her American mother Anne return to the US, this traumatic event reverberates across time and space, and the mystery of what really happened to Serk slowly unravels. 

Flashlight moves between the post-war Korean immigrant community in Japan, to suburban America, and the North Korean regime, to tell the astonishing story of one family swept up in the tides of 20th-century history. 

Nicole’s Thoughts:  I happened to be in Korea when I finished this, so that was fun … I tend to be pretty fascinated with stories of Korea; I still frequently think about The Orphan Master’s Son. The problem with this book is that it just wasn’t very good. We had 3 surly main characters who stayed surly through the whole book. There were jarring jumps in time – all of a sudden you’re like “what happened to Walter?” and “who is Bob?” The author seemed to write the book to fill in the outline and it didn’t matter if it made sense to the story or the reader.

I expect more from Booker nominated books.

Writing quality: 3/5
Originality: 3/5
Character development: 1/4
Plot development: 3/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 11/20

Jen’s Thoughts: This is the sort of book that exemplifies the style of writing that I typically love. The opening section was brilliant, compelling, and first appeared as a short story in the New Yorker. It’s a big book in terms of scope, one that spans decades and unfolds across continents. The novel is about absence, secrecy, and identity. It is about what forms us into the people we become and what shapes how we relate to others. It was a brilliantly ambitious novel and while I enjoyed it, at times I did feel like it bordered on too much. Unlike Audition where the author left it up to the reader to interpret meaning, Flashlight lays it all out for the reader. Beautifully written but I am not sure it’s booker worthy.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 3/5
Character development: 3/4
Plot development: 3/4
Overall enjoyment: 2/2
Total: 16/20

Lisa’s Thoughts: I thought this book would be great, but I ended up feeling like it was too long, and I never really understood the characters, and there wasn’t much plot other the solution to the mystery of Serk’s disappearance. She’s a beautiful writer, but I thought that Trust Exercise as much more engaging.

Writing quality: 4/5
Originality: 4/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 2/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 13/20

Anita’s Thoughts: The beauty and specificity of the writing here stands out. Each sentence like a mini work of art. Unfortunately, from a plot standpoint, it’s completely overwritten. There’s no room for the reader to bring their own experience or viewpoint, and for me, it becomes boring. The characters never seemed fully realized despite all the detail; I just never cared about them.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 3/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 2/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 13/20

Tracy’s Thoughts: I flew through this. The pacing, characters, plot, and themes were interesting. It was based on a real incident, that here in the middle of the US anyway, wasn’t reported or was underreported. So I learned, too. I agree that everything was laid out for the reader- but that may be a good thing in this case- the author seemed to be comparing this incident to current events. And given the apparent decline in smarts here and now…

Writing quality:5/5
Originality: 4/5
Character development: 4/4
Plot development: 3/4
Overall enjoyment: 2/2
Total: 18/20

Rankings
1. Audition: 17.88
2. Flashlight: 14.2
3. One Boat: 13

Have you read it?  What do you think? Which reviewer do you most agree with? Want to try it for yourself? You can purchase your copy here: Flashlight.