I will start with an honest opinion. I found this book bland or rather it fell below my expectations. On other hand, I think its due to the fact I have read back to back books with the same cozy healing genre that by the time I'm reading this, it just felt repetitive. Following the same trend of heartwarming, slice of life cozy genre, this one fit into the slot which may appeal to wider audience for its charm. But to someone like me who kept on reading the almost the same exact trope which to me the book market is now oversaturated with this gets stale very fast. No shades to the current trend because I am amongst those who actually enjoyed & appreciated there are influx of these healing genre because it let us to reconnect & slow down in this chaotic world. Although, this book is average for my liking
A collection of interconnected stories of characters who found comfort & help in this neighbourhood laundromat, Yeonnamdong's Smiley Laundromat. There is Old Jang with his dog, Jindo who have a strained relationship with his son, Mira, a mother struggling to with being a mother, Yeorum an aspiring scriptwriter desperate for a breakthrough, an art student in a painful breakup, a man tried to find his brother's scammer. These characters went to the laundromat, a place where they poured out their feelings or concerns in this olive green diary & others replied to them with heartfelt messages. In essence, the stories in here were definitely heartwarming, it had the quality of comfort in them, helped in rebuilding trust & forming genuine relationships within the community. I do like how some of the stories are relatable & there are some cute moments in here but at the same time, the last story of Old Jang's son actually got on my nerves for how frustratingly selfish his character was
The writing was okay for me, it read easily & very straightforward & tbh, some of the messages can sound preachy at times. There are some lines that i really like, more on the family aspect especially on the last story but the one with scammer felt kinda out of place but they were pretty entertaining on their own. However, I do like how there are a lot of current societal issues are present in this book with the rapid housing development, property price spike in the economic downturn, the misogyny faced by a woman in a relationship where her boyfriend was sharing secret intimate details of their life with his friends, women being target of malicious gossips whenver a break up occured, scams running rampant led to victims demise, mothers struggles to be housewife & expected to run the house, the need to constantly be on top as you send your child away overseas all in names for better education while struggling financially. All of these were talked about in this book & even though they were only surface level, I do like they were brought up. I do wished we get more exploration on these topics but this does reflect the current society which is nice to read
Overall, if you want a cozy comforting read with relatable stories, this may appeal to you
Thank you Definitely Books for review copy in exchange for an honest review