Shadow Chaser is about a ten-year-old girl Yeji who is an outsider in school with no interest in studying. One day she overhears her parents fighting and sees her mom’s shadow leaving her and running away through the window.
Shadow Chaser
Author: Park Solim
Illustrator: Park Solim
Publisher: Woorinabi Publishing Co.
Publication Date: November 30 2022
Genre: Graphic novel for Children
Binding: 170 x 230 mm
Price: 15,000 won
Pages: 224
ISBN: 979-11-91884-29-6 77810
Sponsored and selected by the Korea Manhwa Contents Agency for the diversity program in manhwa in 2021
About the Author:
Park Solim has liked reading comic books and novels ever since she was young, and her happiest memory is of buying comic books on the way from school. Because of her love for manhwa, she always wanted to be a manhwa artist, and after holding different jobs, she finally started to write manhwa. She is the author of X and Zombie Mother, and a short YA graphic novel Burnt Hours. She serialized People Who Change the World for the children’s comic magazine The Whale Said, and a political comic in the Incheon newsletter Namdong Comics.
About the Book:
Shadow Chaser is about a ten-year-old girl Yeji who is an outsider in school with no interest in studying. One day she overhears her parents fighting and sees her mom’s shadow leaving her and running away through the window. When Yeji goes out in search of her mom’s shadow, she meets a cat called Gil whose name means path and discovers that her mother is not the only one who’s missing her shadow. Yeji has been bullied by her classmate Chaeyun, and Yeji sees Chaeyun’s shadow leaving her and running away. Although Chaeyun is a smart and hardworking student, she has been under too much stress from her demanding mother to perform better. Yeji chases after Chaeyun’s shadow and steps on it so that it can return to her. Although Chaeyun is not sure what really took place, she realizes Yeji must have helped her be herself again, and they become friends. And Yeji realizes that a shadow is an inner part of the person which has been repressed and denied. As the shadow chaser, Yeji finds out that there is a dark side even to people who seem happy and cheerful and that she is not the only one who struggles with sadness and loneliness. Her classmate Hyeongtae is by her side as she continues her strange adventure as the shadow chaser, and Hyeongtae helps her realize how talented she is at drawing and how she can be better at studying. The three of them become true friends and learn to be themselves instead of doing their best to outdo others.
Children grow up through the relationship with their friends and family. To children, family is the window to the outside world and defines who they are, and they learn the meaning of happiness from their family. When parents do not have a happy or stable marital relationship, their children often blame themselves. This graphic novel begins with a question what the world looks like to a child who blames herself for the unhappiness of her parents. The main character Yeji is worried that her family might break up because of her and embarks on the adventure of finding her mom’s shadow. When Yeji becomes a shadow chaser, she begins to understand the world of grownups. Her father works day and night as a deliveryman and is too busy even to answer his daughter’s phone calls; her mother has to go back to work after her miscarriage, still struggling with the sense of loss and sadness. There is a moment in everyone’s life when they want to run away from difficulties or reality, and in the graphic novel, this is depicted by a shadow leaving its owner and running away. A shadow is an essential part of the person, and when you deny your shadow, you will lose yourself in the end. As Ursula Le Guin said, “When you light a candle, you also cast a shadow.” The writer also said that avoidance or denial cannot be an answer in this world of light and darkness, and you need courage to face who you really are. In the story, Yeji remembers how happy she was just to be home with her mom and dad all day, and it teaches us the way to protect our loved ones is to protect yourself, and that is the way to find happiness.