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Mary Lynn Bracht 
Hi Ms. Bracht! I’m a freshman in high school and I thought reading your book White Chrysanthemum would be a great start for challenging reading. Now I have to do a project based on the book I read, and one of the question frames for my project is how old the author was when they published the book and where were they living during that time. You seem to have been around the world quite a bit, so I’d really appreciate it if you responded! (Loved the book by the way, brought me to tears!)
Dear Nique
Thank you for your note! Email me your questions at mary.bracht@gmail.com and I would be happy to answer them.
Best wishes!
Mary
Hi,
I just wanted to applaud you for writing such a moving story, White Chrysanthemum. Sadly, it is an aspect of world war 2 that isn’t given its due attention. You did a fantastic job of encapsulating the horrendous atrocities faced by these Halmoni and told a marvelous tale through amazing characters. Your book encouraged me to dive deep into this whole situation. More people need to know about their stories so these tortured souls are never forgotten, and you certainly did your part in ensuring that.
All the best for the future! I’ll be eagerly waiting for your next book.
Thank you Suyash, I’m so pleased you enjoyed the book. So many people still have not heard about this part of history, and sadly the last few survivors are barely holding on. It’s wonderful that more people have come to know them through reading, and I hope this remains true. Keeping their stories alive is one way to honor them and what they endured, and I’m glad to reach new readers like you. Thank you and best wishes!
Hi,
I just wanted to applaud you for writing such a moving story, White Chrysanthemum. Sadly, it is an aspect of world war 2 that isn’t given its due attention. You did a fantastic job of encapsulating the horrendous atrocities faced by these Halmoni and told a marvelous tale through lovable characters. Your book encouraged me to dive deep into this whole situation. More people need to know about their stories so these tortured souls are never forgotten, and you certainly did your part in ensuring that.
All the best for the future! I’ll be eagerly waiting for your next book.
I just finished your beautifully written story of Hana and Emi a few moments ago and felt compelled to do something I have never done before…seek out the author to give a heartfelt thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing their story, the story of ALL the comfort women. I am sitting here in tears, heartbreaking tears for both Emi and Hana in their losses and empty hearts, but also happy tears for Emi in releasing her lifelong secret heartaches in sharing her story with her adult children, as well as Hana’s resolve to stay with Alton. I so wanted a physical reunion, but certainly understood and appreciate the resolve in both their lives. Especially Emi, as she so needed that to pass into the world beyond, to again stand with her mother, father, and Hana, all waiting for her.
I never knew of this heartbreaking time in history before finding your book. Bravo to Kim Hak-sun and the others who bravely shared their stories. Thank you for including your Author’s Note, research guide, and the Korean Timeline. My heart simply broke when I read of the removal of the Statue of Peace. May your writings fill in the void it leaves.
I apologize for my lengthy comment, I am just so moved (and emotionally drained!) , that I felt compelled to thank you for your time, your research, and your beautifully written conceptual understanding of how the story of the comfort women needed to be shared. I am looking forward to finding some of the books in your Further Reading List. I understand you have written a second novel, so will most definitely be looking for that!
Thank you again!!!
Hi Kathryn, thank you so much for messaging me! It’s lovely to hear from you, and I’m very glad you enjoyed reading my book. It’s such a heartbreaking situation for the last remaining grandmothers, but knowing their story continues to reach people is a somber consolation. May we always remember them. 🙏
I picked up this book because my daughter is doing her thesis on comfort women for her masters degree and I had never heard about them before. Your book was so informative and interesting that I was unable to take very many breaks while reading it. I loved the questions that were asked at the end of the book, they answered some of my questions. Thank you for putting in the time and research to write this book.
Thank you so much Pam! I’m glad you enjoyed reading it and best of luck to your daughter. I’m so pleased to learn more young people are interested in studying about this terrible time in history. It’s a difficult topic, but it’s a dark reality that we need to face when studying the war. 🙏
Mary, I just finished White Chrysanthemum and it was a delight. Loved the relationships as they were revealed. Was familiar with the lives of the comfort women but had not read their story in many years. Thank you so much!
Thank you for your message Jack. I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
Just finished this book and it was truly amazing. I could not put it down and it was absolutely heart wrenching. I knew nothing of this terrible history of ‘comfort women’. You inspired me to dig deeper and I was shocked and appalled to see the Peace statue had been removed. May we never forget.
Thank you so much Renee.
Your book was beautiful! Loved your afterward too, I loved understanding more about your process, thank you for sharing! I think I will always have a soft spot fir Mongolia now… hoping you will write more – anything in the works? ❤️
Thank you for your comment Mimi! I’m so glad you enjoyed reading my book. I’m with you, I too fell in love with Mongolia! I have just finished writing book two, which is so exciting! I will definitely post again with more details when I have them. Watch this space!
Hi, sorry i’m French, so my english is…special ! I read your book last April, during the first confinement in France. And it was a marvellous moment ! I didn’t read a book like this one since many years. It was intelligent, instructive, emotionnal… i made a travel in this country, those life, this time. Thank you for this hard but brillant story and for the way you wrote it. Since many months, i buy it for my family and my friends. Everebydo love it. Thank you.
That’s so lovely to hear, thank you so much! 🙏
I just finished reading White Chrysanthemum this evening, and it was the best book I have read in years! I do hope you continue to write more stories of that caliber, and I will be one of your most faithful followers. I’m so glad you let Hana live in the end, because no one deserves life more. Thank you for a sensitive, life affirming story.
Thank you! I’m so glad you enjoyed the story. I’m working on the next one!
Dear Mary,
Your book changed my life. I read it because of the book signing club TAG Livros, of Brazil, with the name “Herdeiras do mar”. You were perfect in your writing and in building the story.
I wrote this comment to thank you fot writing this book.
Wish you the best things!
xoxo, Juliana
Hi Juliana, thank you so much for your wonderful message! I so touched 🙏🥰 Thank you!
How lucky to have discovered your book because my wife is part of a women’s book club. The happy end of Hanna’s destiny in this united, free and living family on the great plains of Mongolia is great and allayed my indignation. One of the mysteries of the female soul for a man is Emi’s love for the children she had with her husband, her father’s murderer.
Love, poetry, what a joy to read your book and to forget this world which does not seem to have understood the essentials.
Excuse the mistakes, I’m French.
Thank you for your comment Bob! You’ve brightened up a rather dreary Wednesday 🤗
What a wonderful book. I am so glad that I read it. It needs to be known.
Thank you so much Marilyn! I’m glad you you did, and I hope their story spreads far and wide 🙏
Hello Ms. Bracht, do you have any interest in doing school visits (in S. Korea, Jeju Island)?
Hi Amber, yes I would! You can instant message me on Twitter @marylynnbracht
I tried to message you but my 14 year-old (aka as my assistant for all things social media) said your account isn’t accepting messages, or something. Could we email? I know it’s very old school. I’m at ahadley@nlcsjeju.kr. thanks-
If you are going to be in New Orleans, La. for Feb 17th, 2019, please advise. I’m having a book club at my house with White Chrysanthemum and you are most welcome to attend.
I just read your heart-wrenching, fantastic, novel and the next day I thought your storytelling of the sisters and the one, a ‘comfort woman’, would make a fabulous movie. That same day I read about the release of the film of Crazy Rich Asians. Wow! I hope you will pursue White Chrysthansemum becoming a movie with a sensitive director and cast. I also look forward to your future writings. Thank You, Ms. Bracht for the tenderness, rage, and passion of your characters in the book.
Thank you Jan! It would be wonderful to see Hana and Emi come to life on film one day. Anything is possible! I’m so pleased you enjoyed their story. 🙏❤️
I am looking for a good book on the history of Korea that does not focus on the Korean War alone. Would you have any suggestions? I always want to back what I read in fictionalized form with the straight factual history if at all possible.
Hi Bonnie, I love to do that too! I included a reading list in the back of the book with some great suggestions. I think numbers 1 & 6 might be good reads for you:
1. A History of East Asia: From the Origins of Civilization to the Twenty-First Century by Charles Holcombe
6. Everlasting Flower: A History of Korea by Keith Pratt
Check them out and perhaps they can lead you to more sources to read — depending on what you’re searching for. Good luck! 😊
Thank you for writing White Chrysanthemum. It has opened my eyes while making me weep.
You’re very welcome Nicole, thank you 🙏
Hi Mary,
I am not sure how your book flew past my radar but I’m so glad to have found it and I’ll be reading it soon. I wish I would have met you prior to the publication of an anthology of Mixec Korean Stories that was just launched because it woukd have been an honor to have you contribute. Congratulations on getting published to such acclaim! So exciting. I’m working, with the help of an agent, on a fictionalized version of my mother’s life story revolving around her life in a camp town and how she met my father. Also there is a group for Korean American Writers that I can send you an invite for if you’re interested. Many names you’d recognize in the group. Just drop me a line via my email. Again huge congrats on your debut! And FYI my website is being updated so the link below won’t get you to anything yet.