Hello Baby: A Novel

The bonds between six women undergoing IVF are tested when one announces an unexpected birth in this absorbing, candid novel about what women endure to become mothers

“Already a feminist sensation in South Korea, it’s candid, sharp and quietly devastating. And at just over 200 pages, you’ll finish it in a sitting and think about it for weeks.”—Dua Lipa’s Service95

Outside the chat, they had different jobs, personalities, financial backgrounds, but inside, they were all mothers-to-be anxiously awaiting their babies.

At a fertility clinic in Seoul, six women in their thirties and forties become friends. To comfort one another while undergoing IVF, they create the group chat “Hello Baby.” Over the course of two years, they share personal stories on their way to motherhood, until one, forty-six-year-old Jung-hyo, suddenly announces she has stopped treatment and disappears from the friend group. But after a year of silence, on Lunar New Year, she drops a text in the chat with the news that she recently gave birth to a baby girl. She invites the group over to celebrate her daughter’s birth. With a mix of envy and admiration, the women gather, but their doubts and suspicions threaten a friendship already stressed by uncertainty.

Switching between the six characters—a journalist, a police officer, a vet, a lawyer, and two housewives—this thought-provoking novel explores the social pressure and emotional strain on women struggling to conceive. Written with insight, humor, and great empathy, Hello Baby is a moving portrait of what it means to be a woman today and the lengths some will go to seek motherhood.