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Pool House
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Expected 9 Jun 26Win a free print copy of this book!
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100 copies available
U.S. only
Stevie cannot escape her mother. Abandoning college plans to work a dead-end job, her days are a purgatorial bore. Many dream of moving to L.A. and into the spotlight, but Stevie can’t wait to move away from it, and her mother’s orbit, to start over.
Moon is many an out-of-work actress, a recovering addict, whatever a mistress becomes when she’s widowed, and a mother. Reeling in the aftermath of her lover and TV husband’s death, Moon struggles to process her grief. And the last thing she expects is for Stevie to leave her too.
Now, neither Stevie nor Moon can afford to quit each other. And their cost of living forces them into a glass-walled pool house in the backyard, while their home is rented out to pay the bills. But when Adam, Moon’s former TV son and Stevie’s forever crush, arrives for the funeral, the three are pulled into a messy orbit, moving back into the ‘Big House’ and play-acting a picture-perfect family even as tensions rise and relationships unravel.
Pool House is a course charted through the wilderness of motherhood, a story about the challenges of navigating class, fame, burgeoning sexuality, and grief as two women grapple with what it means to grow up and grow older in Hollywood.
Moon is many an out-of-work actress, a recovering addict, whatever a mistress becomes when she’s widowed, and a mother. Reeling in the aftermath of her lover and TV husband’s death, Moon struggles to process her grief. And the last thing she expects is for Stevie to leave her too.
Now, neither Stevie nor Moon can afford to quit each other. And their cost of living forces them into a glass-walled pool house in the backyard, while their home is rented out to pay the bills. But when Adam, Moon’s former TV son and Stevie’s forever crush, arrives for the funeral, the three are pulled into a messy orbit, moving back into the ‘Big House’ and play-acting a picture-perfect family even as tensions rise and relationships unravel.
Pool House is a course charted through the wilderness of motherhood, a story about the challenges of navigating class, fame, burgeoning sexuality, and grief as two women grapple with what it means to grow up and grow older in Hollywood.
12 pages, Audible Audio
Expected publication June 9, 2026
9652 people want to read
About the author
Mary H.K. Choi
23 books2,724 followersMary H.K. Choi is a Korean-American author, editor, television and print journalist. She is the author of young adult novel Emergency Contact (2018). She is the culture correspondent on Vice News Tonight on HBO and was previously a columnist at Wired and Allure magazines as well as a freelance writer. She attended a large public high school in a suburb of San Antonio, then college at the University of Texas at Austin, where she majored in Textile and Apparel.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
Want to Read
November 10, 2025and just like that... my most anticipated 2026 publication is here <3
♡ Emergency Contact ★★★★★
♡ Permanent Record ★★★★★
♡ Yolk ★★★★★
♡ Emergency Contact ★★★★★
♡ Permanent Record ★★★★★
♡ Yolk ★★★★★
Want to Read
November 10, 2025i have been YEARNING for a new Mary H.K. Choi !!!
Emergency Contact: 5/5
Permanent Record: 4/5
Emergency Contact: 5/5
Permanent Record: 4/5
Want to Read
April 3, 2026wow okay so a few months ago my father went on a work trip in new york and received a bunch of arcs including one for this book???? i need to read it ASAP!! this is so exciting!
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance reader copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.*
Pool House follows Stevie who doesn’t have the best relationship with her mother. Her mother is an out-of-work actress and a recovering addict who hasn’t always shown up for Stevie in the ways she should have. Stevie wants to get away from her mother but for now, Stevie and Moon are stuck together, living in their glass pool house in their backyard as they rent their home to pay the bills. Adam arrives for the funeral of Moon’s lover and TV husband as he played Moon’s son on TV. Stevie had a crush on him as a child and the three of them end up living together and acting as a family. Moon needs some acting work and tensions arise with Moon and Stevie as Stevie makes plans to move away and spends more time with Adam.
I enjoyed reading this novel and I easily connected to Stevie. This novel is told from the perspective of Stevie, Moon and Adam but I easily related to Stevie as she wants to make a life for herself away from her mother and family legacy. I liked that each POV of each character was shown and I found it easy to understand Moon and Adam’s motivations. Each character is complex and this had a lot to say on fame, aging and relationships. The writing of this book is good and I had a really enjoyable time reading this. I didn’t love the ending though and it kind of left a sour taste in my mouth so this is a four star read for me.
Pool House follows Stevie who doesn’t have the best relationship with her mother. Her mother is an out-of-work actress and a recovering addict who hasn’t always shown up for Stevie in the ways she should have. Stevie wants to get away from her mother but for now, Stevie and Moon are stuck together, living in their glass pool house in their backyard as they rent their home to pay the bills. Adam arrives for the funeral of Moon’s lover and TV husband as he played Moon’s son on TV. Stevie had a crush on him as a child and the three of them end up living together and acting as a family. Moon needs some acting work and tensions arise with Moon and Stevie as Stevie makes plans to move away and spends more time with Adam.
I enjoyed reading this novel and I easily connected to Stevie. This novel is told from the perspective of Stevie, Moon and Adam but I easily related to Stevie as she wants to make a life for herself away from her mother and family legacy. I liked that each POV of each character was shown and I found it easy to understand Moon and Adam’s motivations. Each character is complex and this had a lot to say on fame, aging and relationships. The writing of this book is good and I had a really enjoyable time reading this. I didn’t love the ending though and it kind of left a sour taste in my mouth so this is a four star read for me.
Want to Read
January 30, 2026Yolk killed me (positive) so I can't wait for this one. It's been wayy too long since I've read a Mary H.K Choi book. I even remember when this was called Milk Teeth.
Review of advance copy received from Goodreads Giveaways
HMM... I see!.. a book about nothing but captures it well. This story is at its best when it’s functioning as some kind of character study of a dysfunctional mother-daughter duo. There is no real plot or action, but we're propelled forward by unraveling the mystery of why these women are the way they are.
There were a couple instances where I thought it captured navigating female sexuality well, even better than most , but usually it felt.. very literary fiction pornographic as has for whatever reason been decided crucial to the genre. Including such hits as, "drinking from her pussy like a coconut" (lol) and a graphic description of a child masturbating and the scent and texture of her child cum. Truly beyond me. And it's early on too! I think the sexual encounters stand out so much because they feel like lone points of action. The rest of the story appears to be people standing around frowning, which I love and the characters are strongly built enough to do so. But the disconnect between the actual story happening and the seemingly random but perhaps not unrelated sex is further sealed by the way the writing feels so naturally encompassing in dialogue and in introspection, but becomes haughty and ungraceful when it's time to pose for some oh la la sex shame! We don't learn much about our characters from these regular encounters besides the constant reminder that they do not like themselves, and are ridiculous people, which we can already pull from the rest of the nonsense they do. Well okay I'll take it then! If that's what you want from me!
I loved the way Moon and Stevie were captured, they both felt so real to me, especially Stevie's 20 year old no longer a true teenager but far from an actual adult mannerisms and thinking. Her rose-colored fantastical mindset in the end moved me so much I actually said oh no out loud. Though Moon’s internal struggle with aging as a woman while still wanting to feel like the only girl in the world was also very authentic. The way we’re introduced to them in the beginning of the story at the grocery store was so great. They both are actually really annoying in the best way, and I hate that they never really explored or pulled on too many of their threads, because we're always moving on to the next Silly Thing They Do to fill out this 300+ page book where there's no change in situation until the last 50 pages. But truthfully in a way I thought it fitting to a story about Hollywood, where every day feels the same in that both blessing and a curse type of way, pushing forward toward seemingly nothing, until something actually happens that you have to deal with, but then you just go back to being miserable like normal after. I hate that this story was so toothless while also ending on a cheesed wall-shit-slinging. A lot of stuff was presented but not much of it truly examined. The only apparent throughline in the book (mommy issues) ended up just being for some kind of perverted disagreeable titillation, and the one piece of supposed plot-driver (grief/the complexity of it) was mostly quietly fizzled out before the "climax" so we could get to more of the hand-in-pants drama.
It almost seemed like the sex dynamics were just thrown in in order to have a reason to talk about our main characters but honestly I think they would've shined even more if it was turned down like, 15%, but while I do feel like the ending was a kind of gratuitous nothingburger I also appreciated that at least it went all the way in going all the way lol. I don't mean to give the impression that a story about two women can't have its fair share of sex and complicated feelings about it, but it was the sporadic inconsistency of its portrayal that distressed me.. at what point does painting women as self-hating sexual over-givers stop being a Profound Story Element and start being.. just exhausting? I guess my biggest umbrage with it all is the way that as women we are always combatting these tedious push and pull dynamics from the rest of the world in terms of sex and our own desire, so when we get the chance to explore ourselves in reading and writing, why copy paste the same dysfunction? Why are we lying to ourselves about it all being totally our idea even in print? At least let them admit to hating the way things are from the safety of non-existence in this 3D world. I think a lot of the sex in this book felt like something the women were “giving” the men. Their pleasure felt very divorced from their bodies and instead rooted in their minds and how it made them look or seem, or feel about themselves in terms of confidence or lack of. Which of course is representative of reality as a lot of this book is, but in this case seemingly for the purpose of getting off to and not much else, which felt awkward next to mild explorations of grief. Grief about growing up, grief about succeeding, or I guess grief about human relationships in general, in all the ways. Perhaps even grief about being a man/woman specifically and having to perform that all the time. It’s not that I didn’t welcome its presence but that I did and then it over-stayed that welcome, turning me sour against it! It just didn’t feel cohesive in terms of what this book is About (Feelings? Having them? Some of the different ways inferiority can manifest in human beings?). I guess I got to the end of the book and looked back over everything I had just read and felt a little.. incomplete. My journey had no satisfying conclusion, but was just a bunch of pit stops where I sometimes got really delicious snacks but sometimes they were stale and kind of hurt my stomach idk. Mostly I'm upset because I truly loved these characters and this writing but I trotted through my 319 pages without them ever doing much.
BUT for all my complaining I actually really had fun reading this book. It was up and down for me and definitely peaked in the middle when it felt like we were really gonna get into these people, instead of just skimming a broader and broader surface. But Moon and Stevie were consistently very charming and compelling characters to read, as well as every minor character along the way feeling so real and complete regardless of how brief they were visible. And I love the cover design, one of those details that is simple enough to be hard to get right but oh so important!! I feel it really captures the vibe of what you're about to get into. Don’t be scared by the paragraphs of grumbling I just put you through, I'm glad I read it and I’ve come here now to recommend it to you too. Though I would liken the reading experience to maintaining a consistent, regular, non-dangerous nor stressful speed on the 110 in that kooky ye olden curvy part, only to suddenly look away from the road for no real reason and crash into the wall, then it's over and done and you didn't even feel or realize it was happening, you just blink from your car to the eternal void and you didn't even get to feel a type of way about it.
There were a couple instances where I thought it captured navigating female sexuality well, even better than most , but usually it felt.. very literary fiction pornographic as has for whatever reason been decided crucial to the genre. Including such hits as, "drinking from her pussy like a coconut" (lol) and a graphic description of a child masturbating and the scent and texture of her child cum. Truly beyond me. And it's early on too! I think the sexual encounters stand out so much because they feel like lone points of action. The rest of the story appears to be people standing around frowning, which I love and the characters are strongly built enough to do so. But the disconnect between the actual story happening and the seemingly random but perhaps not unrelated sex is further sealed by the way the writing feels so naturally encompassing in dialogue and in introspection, but becomes haughty and ungraceful when it's time to pose for some oh la la sex shame! We don't learn much about our characters from these regular encounters besides the constant reminder that they do not like themselves, and are ridiculous people, which we can already pull from the rest of the nonsense they do. Well okay I'll take it then! If that's what you want from me!
I loved the way Moon and Stevie were captured, they both felt so real to me, especially Stevie's 20 year old no longer a true teenager but far from an actual adult mannerisms and thinking. Her rose-colored fantastical mindset in the end moved me so much I actually said oh no out loud. Though Moon’s internal struggle with aging as a woman while still wanting to feel like the only girl in the world was also very authentic. The way we’re introduced to them in the beginning of the story at the grocery store was so great. They both are actually really annoying in the best way, and I hate that they never really explored or pulled on too many of their threads, because we're always moving on to the next Silly Thing They Do to fill out this 300+ page book where there's no change in situation until the last 50 pages. But truthfully in a way I thought it fitting to a story about Hollywood, where every day feels the same in that both blessing and a curse type of way, pushing forward toward seemingly nothing, until something actually happens that you have to deal with, but then you just go back to being miserable like normal after. I hate that this story was so toothless while also ending on a cheesed wall-shit-slinging. A lot of stuff was presented but not much of it truly examined. The only apparent throughline in the book (mommy issues) ended up just being for some kind of perverted disagreeable titillation, and the one piece of supposed plot-driver (grief/the complexity of it) was mostly quietly fizzled out before the "climax" so we could get to more of the hand-in-pants drama.
It almost seemed like the sex dynamics were just thrown in in order to have a reason to talk about our main characters but honestly I think they would've shined even more if it was turned down like, 15%, but while I do feel like the ending was a kind of gratuitous nothingburger I also appreciated that at least it went all the way in going all the way lol. I don't mean to give the impression that a story about two women can't have its fair share of sex and complicated feelings about it, but it was the sporadic inconsistency of its portrayal that distressed me.. at what point does painting women as self-hating sexual over-givers stop being a Profound Story Element and start being.. just exhausting? I guess my biggest umbrage with it all is the way that as women we are always combatting these tedious push and pull dynamics from the rest of the world in terms of sex and our own desire, so when we get the chance to explore ourselves in reading and writing, why copy paste the same dysfunction? Why are we lying to ourselves about it all being totally our idea even in print? At least let them admit to hating the way things are from the safety of non-existence in this 3D world. I think a lot of the sex in this book felt like something the women were “giving” the men. Their pleasure felt very divorced from their bodies and instead rooted in their minds and how it made them look or seem, or feel about themselves in terms of confidence or lack of. Which of course is representative of reality as a lot of this book is, but in this case seemingly for the purpose of getting off to and not much else, which felt awkward next to mild explorations of grief. Grief about growing up, grief about succeeding, or I guess grief about human relationships in general, in all the ways. Perhaps even grief about being a man/woman specifically and having to perform that all the time. It’s not that I didn’t welcome its presence but that I did and then it over-stayed that welcome, turning me sour against it! It just didn’t feel cohesive in terms of what this book is About (Feelings? Having them? Some of the different ways inferiority can manifest in human beings?). I guess I got to the end of the book and looked back over everything I had just read and felt a little.. incomplete. My journey had no satisfying conclusion, but was just a bunch of pit stops where I sometimes got really delicious snacks but sometimes they were stale and kind of hurt my stomach idk. Mostly I'm upset because I truly loved these characters and this writing but I trotted through my 319 pages without them ever doing much.
BUT for all my complaining I actually really had fun reading this book. It was up and down for me and definitely peaked in the middle when it felt like we were really gonna get into these people, instead of just skimming a broader and broader surface. But Moon and Stevie were consistently very charming and compelling characters to read, as well as every minor character along the way feeling so real and complete regardless of how brief they were visible. And I love the cover design, one of those details that is simple enough to be hard to get right but oh so important!! I feel it really captures the vibe of what you're about to get into. Don’t be scared by the paragraphs of grumbling I just put you through, I'm glad I read it and I’ve come here now to recommend it to you too. Though I would liken the reading experience to maintaining a consistent, regular, non-dangerous nor stressful speed on the 110 in that kooky ye olden curvy part, only to suddenly look away from the road for no real reason and crash into the wall, then it's over and done and you didn't even feel or realize it was happening, you just blink from your car to the eternal void and you didn't even get to feel a type of way about it.
Want to Read
November 8, 2025new mary hk choi in 2026…life is worth living
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Stevie is the young adult daughter of an out of work actress, Moon, whose life is stalled as she works a fast food job and lives with her mom in the pool house of their beautiful home, which they now rent out through AirBNB because of Moon's poor financial decision. When Moon's long time love, affair partner, and onetime sitcom costar dies, her TV son Adam arrives in town for the funeral and stays with them. They move back into the "big house" so Adam doesn't know they have many troubles. But of course he can tell something is wrong. In fact, nothing between the mother and daughter feels right.
The entanglements between these three characters dealing with their grief and own feelings of being stuck get so messy. The story moves back and forth through their perspectives and creates a sense of mystery by holding a lot back from the reader. The characters felt incredibly real and the writing was perceptive. But I also never felt comfortable within the arc of the story. And the way they treated each other and themselves was so sad.
I love Mary H.K. Choi's YA novels, but this one was too scattered and depressing for me to have the same enthusiasm for, despite the beautiful writing and characterization.
Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!
The entanglements between these three characters dealing with their grief and own feelings of being stuck get so messy. The story moves back and forth through their perspectives and creates a sense of mystery by holding a lot back from the reader. The characters felt incredibly real and the writing was perceptive. But I also never felt comfortable within the arc of the story. And the way they treated each other and themselves was so sad.
I love Mary H.K. Choi's YA novels, but this one was too scattered and depressing for me to have the same enthusiasm for, despite the beautiful writing and characterization.
Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!
April 22, 2026
Moon is an out of work actress and a recovering alcoholic. Her daughter, Stevie, is working at a fast food restaurant after deciding not to leave her mother and go to college at NYU. The two of them are currently living in their pool house so that Moon can rent out the main house to short-term renters to help pay the mortgage. When Moon's former t.v. husband and past lover dies by suicide, Moon's former t.v. son (Adam) comes to L.A. for the funeral. Stevie has had a crush on Adam forever. As the three of them reconnect and begin living together again in the main house, what each of them wants in life and how to get there also collide.
This is one of those books where I honestly struggled to come up with a rating. Part of me thought that it was slow with no real plot and a bit over the top in a lot of respects. But part of me really got involved with the characters and felt compelled to read their story and see where it went.
The writing is very good. I can see why a lot of people who have read her previous work were excited to read this. It's a book that will stick with you, but from my own personal perspective, I'm just not sure that I liked it enough to give it more than three stars.
I received an advance review copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
This is one of those books where I honestly struggled to come up with a rating. Part of me thought that it was slow with no real plot and a bit over the top in a lot of respects. But part of me really got involved with the characters and felt compelled to read their story and see where it went.
The writing is very good. I can see why a lot of people who have read her previous work were excited to read this. It's a book that will stick with you, but from my own personal perspective, I'm just not sure that I liked it enough to give it more than three stars.
I received an advance review copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Review of advance copy
After reading Yolk, I was quite enthusiastic about having the chance to read an advanced copy of Pool House. That being said, this was an interesting look into the lives of Hollywood families that have moved a bit past their prime and the struggles they can endure. It also delves into some of the nuances of Korean American families and the hierarchy therein. I did enjoy the changing POVs to help keep a grasp of the storyline. Unfortunately for me, Pool House fell a little flat, even though the characters were relatively relatable in some sense. The ending was not as catching as I had hoped for one of the main characters and I set the book down with a slight feeling of injustice. The writing itself is excellent; kudos to Mary H.K. Choi for another well written, engaging read.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Incredibly daring and articulate and visceral. Mary HK Choi remains one of my favorite writers because of the depth she gives to characters and the richness she builds into their internal worlds / desires. A particularly apt tension beautifully written about the enmeshment of family (chosen or otherwise) and how that gets created from perpetuated cyclical familial experiences. Cannot wait to have everyone else read this!
A book that shows you freedom is only possible once you confront your worst fears.
A book that shows you freedom is only possible once you confront your worst fears.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
So much dysfunction in this real family and tv family dynamics. Mothers and daughters are always complicated but throw in a star, who is more child then mother, a kid, who is more mother then child, and add in unrequited crushes, as well as unusual living situations, it becomes even more complex. Choi has a way of writing characters that are so multidimensional and this is no different.
I received an arc from the publisher but all opinions are my own.
I received an arc from the publisher but all opinions are my own.
Want to Read
November 20, 2025i didn't know this was happening
love the cover
love the cover
Want to Read
April 8, 2026I received this book for free through Goodreads Giveaways. It is an advance reader's edition.
Review of advance copy received from Author
Nobody writes like Mary H.K. Choi. Within one paragraph of Pool House you'll be like "fuck yeah I'm reading a Mary H.K. Choi book!!!"
Anyway I loved this. God bless the inimitable.
Anyway I loved this. God bless the inimitable.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews