‘Korean Jesus’ by Pete Hsu

Korean Jesus by Pete Hsu, 2019

The magic trick:

Generating story movement even as the story stays in one place

I watched “12 Angry Men” the other day, so perhaps this technique is fresh in my head.

One scene, one set, an entire movie.

Here in “Korean Jesus” I guess we have two scenes, so it’s not quite the same. But it’s close. The vast majority of the story is a single scene – our narrator walking up and taking in a sermon from a preacher in a park.

The author is able to sustain suspense with an early mention of a gun and through the strange coincidence of the preacher’s sermon seeing to be about the narrator. That’s enough to keep the story moving even as we stay in the same place.

And that’s quite a trick on Hsu’s part.

The selection:

Amen Guy mouths the words. Aren’t you hot?

I shake my head.

I mouth the words: No, I’m okay.

The person with the guitar starts to play another song. This song is a song by a guy who was the singer in an old punk rock band. But this song is not a punk rock song. It’s a pretty song called “Fields of Gold.” I like that song. It’s pretty, especially the way the person with the guitar sings it. I sort of get lost in the song for a second. The sun is setting and there is a kind of goldenness to everything.

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