The Korean novel that sold the most copies in translation overseas last year was a quiet story about a neighborhood bookstore.
The Turkish edition of Hwang Bo-reum's Welcome To The Hyunam-dong Bookshop sold more than 60,000 copies in 2025, making it the bestselling translated Korean novel overseas last year, according to the Literature Translation Institute of Korea.
The Culture Ministry-affiliated organisation said the Turkish-language edition, published in 2023, has sold more than 160,000 copies.
Originally published in Korea in 2022, the heartwarming novel is widely credited with helping fuel the country's wave of "healing fiction." It follows the lives of ordinary people who find comfort, friendship and a renewed sense of purpose at a neighborhood bookstore in Seoul.
The novel went on to become a runaway bestseller at home and abroad, selling more than one million copies across editions translated into 50 languages, according to its Korean publisher, Clayhouse.
The strongest momentum in overseas sales came from healing fiction centred on rest, emotional recovery and human connection.
In addition to Welcome To The Hyunam-dong Bookshop, the six translated editions of which sold about 88,000 copies last year, The Second Chance Convenience Store by Kim Ho-yeon sold some 66,000 copies across nine translated editions. The Rainfall Market by You Yeong-gwang, published in English in 2024, sold some 16,000 copies within two years of its release.
Overseas sales of translated Korean literature reached 1,197,557 copies in 2025, marking the second consecutive year that annual sales totalled around 1.2 million.From 2021 through 2025, cumulative sales of 1,026 translated titles published in 40 languages reached some 3.58 million copies.
Chon Soo-young, president of LTI Korea, said the figures show that "the global expansion of Korean literature is no longer a temporary phenomenon, but one supported by a sustainable readership."
The report also found that Korean literature's overseas bestsellers are becoming increasingly diverse. Fifty translated titles sold more than 5,000 copies last year, including 28 that exceeded 10,000 copies.
The English edition of Greek Lessons by Han Kang, the Russian edition of The Girl With The Fox Tail, the first book in Sohn Won-pyung's The Fox Club series, and the Spanish edition of Grass by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim were among seven titles that have sold more than 4,000 copies annually for three consecutive years since 2023.
Han Kang's We Do Not Part recorded the strongest long-term performance. Between 2023 and 2025, the novel sold about 300,000 copies across 13 countries, the highest cumulative sales of any title in the survey.
The institute said the figures suggest that demand for Han's work has continued to grow across countries and language markets, extending well beyond the initial surge of international attention following her Nobel Prize in 2024. – The Korea Herald/Asia News Network
