Buried deep in research, ideas for new stories start to flutter. Suspense, calamity, and a small dose of a slow burn romance strikes. A story set in 1506, during Korea’s Joseon Dynasty and the reign of the tyrant King Yeonsan, comes to life as author June Hur delves deeper in her exploration for her next book. Following a “prickly heroine,” who is determined to save her older sister from the king, and a “morally gray” prince, who joins forces with this heroine, A Crane Among Wolves is born.

Hur is known for her bestselling novels such as The Silence of Bones, The Forest of Stolen Girls, and The Red Palace, which all “read like historical K-dramas.” She has been teasing her anticipated fourth book, A Crane Among Wolves, for quite a while, but it has now been released into the world. EnVi chatted with Hur over a video call about the process of bringing this new book to life. 

Journey to Becoming an Author

Hur grew up between South Korea, Canada, and the U.S.A. She was born and raised in South Korea, although she later moved to Canada before returning to her home country for high school. Her passion for literature and history began when she was given a favorite novel in the literary world, Pride and Prejudice.

“When I was in middle school, my grades in English were actually not really good and so my dad [got] worried,” Hur started. “He’s like, ‘you need to read books,’ and so he’d bring me random books. Then finally he got me a copy of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and that’s when I fell head over heels in love.” Soon after, this experience and book sparked a newfound love for history, specifically for the Regency England era.

Hur is honest when sharing online about her humble beginnings of trying to get published. She first started writing historical books set in Britain. After many trials and tribulations for 10 years — agents being interested, asking for rewrites, and not being interested in the end — Hur felt worn down. She turned away from writing to try her hand at other things, like teaching. 

“When the itch to write came back, [I thought] ‘Am I going to write another British historical?’ […] There was just so much grief involved in [the process so] I didn’t even want to touch British history,” Hur expressed. “I wanted something fresh and new to kind of mark a new page being turned in my writing journey.” Hur then spent more time thinking about what type of history she wanted to write about. She thought about writing Canadian and American histories, but she felt it wasn’t her story to tell. In a surprising turn of events, Hur didn’t think about dabbling in Korean history until she considered all her options.

“I kind of brainwashed myself by [thinking] Korean history was not relevant to me, so I disconnected myself from it, ” Hur said. Growing up in Canada during the ‘90s played a role in how she viewed her culture. “Korean culture wasn’t popular. My friends didn’t even know where it existed and so there was this sense of shame involved with Korea,” she added. Despite Hur’s feelings towards her country, she had a big interest in K-dramas, more specifically, historical K-dramas. One day she felt she had watched all the good ones and her hunger for more grew, but she could not be satisfied. Hur then decided to turn to new sources.

“So I was like, ‘maybe I’ll just read a bit about Korean history,’ just to fill that void in me that yearns for more historical K-dramas,” Hur mused, remembering when she had pushed into a territory she had been reluctant about. “[I read the Encounter by Hahn Moo-Sook] and fell so deeply in love with Korean history. I realized everything I thought I knew […] was very surface level and almost borderline stereotypical.” 

Thus, her passion for learning and writing about Korean history fully blossomed, and in turn, she has found success in every book she has written. From readers commenting high praise about her books to landing multiple book contracts, Hur’s hard work had paid off. These books had become her “love letters to Korean history.”

Based on the Dark Reign of the 10th King

The research process for Hur may be arduous for each of her books, but there is always something to be uncovered and used as a potential writing idea. When Hur finds an interesting historical event, she keeps note and tries to explore it more when considering her next books. Her research finds can be as small everyday life details to include in the characters lives or they can turn out to be the plot of her next book. This was the case for A Crane Among Wolves.

“For [this book], that was the reign of King Yeonsangun [also known as King Yeonsan], he was one of Korea’s most hated tyrant kings,” Hur said. He wasn’t always a good king, but after he learned about the tragedy of what happened to his mother, he went on a downward spiral committing many atrocities. King Yeonsan fantasized about kidnapping 10,000 girls and forcing them to become female entertainers by the end of his reign. He captured around 1,000 girls before he was deposed. 

“As a Korean, learning these things about my own country’s past was just so shocking,” Hur emphasized. “I think that kind of curiosity and horror is what made me want to learn a bit more about it and kind of use the research to create the story. And obviously, I wanted to add a bit of romance too.” 

To stay true to history, without making the book fantasy, Hur maintained the authenticity of the historical setting and the king. She then created the fictional main characters Iseul and Prince Daehyun — a heroine paired with a prince who is the half brother of the king.

Content Warning

While researching for A Crane Among Wolves, her findings affirmed how dark, violent, and disturbing history can be. Since the book is marketed as a young adult book, this was something that Hur had to think about. “One of my concerns was ‘Do I censor history? How do I make history more palatable or acceptable to readers?’” she admitted. “[…] At the end of the day, teens know what they can handle and at the same time I think it’s important to show history with all its violence and darkness because when we don’t study history a lot of times it repeats itself.” 

Due to the nature of the history shared in the book, Hur emphasized that readers should read the content warning before diving into the book. “There’s a content warning before the book starts that I’d recommend readers check out before progressing, just to make sure there’s nothing that’s too triggering [for them],” Hur highlighted.

Fleshing Out the Story

As a mom of two kids, Hur’s writing process depends on the moments she has to herself. When time permits, Hur turns on her Spotify playlist for her book and grabs a pen and paper to get her creative juices flowing. She went on to tell EnVi about finding motivation to write her books: “When I began writing Crane, the question I always asked myself is ‘What is the heart of this book?’ And in other words, ‘Why should I care about this book?’ Because when we [authors] write, a lot of times we lose inspiration, we get tired, and we’re like, ‘I don’t want to work on this book anymore,’” Hur said. “I needed a beating heart in the book that motivates me to keep on writing through those slumps and for me, that heart [came from] community.”

Hur started to work on A Crane Among Wolves during the Covid-19 pandemic, a time of loneliness and isolation. The importance of community became apparent to her, which went on to become one of the core narratives in the book. “I wanted to kind of capture the [sense of] community in Crane. So one of the biggest subplots is the found family trope in my book,” Hur revealed. 

Iseul, a lone wolf, is someone who is wary of the world. “She starts off as someone who was so traumatized. She’s like ‘I don’t want anyone in my life, I just have this mission to save my sister. I don’t need friends,’” Hur teased as she talked about the stubborn heroine. Along the way, this heroine finds friends who “never abandoned her in times of trouble […] That’s when she realizes that she does need to rely on other people, and that there are people who actually do care about it. That’s where the found family happens,” she explained further. 

A Prickly Heroine and a Morally Gray Prince

Before her characters had their final voices and personalities, “they were just nice characters,” Hur said. Thanks to the ideas her editor planted in Hur’s mind, she was able to create her characters to be more dynamic. Her editor suggested trying out the enemies to lovers trope for A Crane Among Wolves. From there, Hur formed the baseline for her main characters as a prickly heroine and a morally gray prince. She then figured out how they would fall in love.

“As I wrote about them, they kind of just came to life. Usually, it’s such chaos. I don’t really know what I’m doing as I’m writing, so it was a lot of trial and error,” Hur laughed as she tried to recall the development of the two.

Another suggestion Hur’s editor made was to write the book from a dual point of view. This was something Hur had never done before, so it was a bit of a challenge. Writing Iseul’s point of view was easy as all of her previous books were written from the point of view of the female protagonists. She then chose to write Prince Daehyun’s point of view in third person. Since he had gone through many traumatic experiences, he tends to shut off his feelings. Writing in third person was the best option to capture how distant and cold he is due to being emotionally disconnected.

When it came time to write all the chapters together, Hur initially wrote them back to back as they alternated — Iseul then the Prince — but it got to be confusing for her. She then rerouted her writing process to sticking to what she was comfortable with. “What I ended up doing was [writing] the entire book in first person with blank chapters, alternating with her chapters, and then I would kind of leave notes like ‘it’s his chapter now’ and ‘maybe this [chapter] could be about this,’” Hur explained. “When I was in revision mode, that’s when I actually started really fleshing out his chapters. So his story came later because I needed to know [Iseul’s] story first in order to figure out what his story would be,” she added.

Nonetheless, Hur is excited for readers to meet the characters, especially the Prince. He may be cold but is “actually a cinnamon roll at heart,” Hur mentioned in an Instagram reel. She also has yet to introduce her other characters from the book that are full of personality and are waiting to be seen.

Three Things to Look Out For

Hur shared with EnVi some fun things to look out for in A Crane Among Wolves. “The Red Lantern Inn is kind of the main location the book revolves around. This is actually mentioned in my previous two books,” Hur revealed. She further explained this small connection: the protagonists in her book The Red Palace had their investigative conversations at the Inn, while the heroine of A Crane Among Wolves essentially lives there.

When EnVi asked about any particular chapters or scenes Hur was most excited for readers to get to, she playfully answered right away. “Yes, chapter 42. That’s all I’ll say,” Hur laughed lightly. “I’m very curious to know people’s reaction to that chapter. So far reviewers who have gotten to that chapter will message me and be like ‘Oh my gosh! You’re so cruel!’ So I am very curious,” she emphasized. Hur has certainly teased this chapter on her Instagram and TikTok, leaving most readers waiting in anticipation and those who have already read it to relive the chapter.

Some of Hur’s favorite scenes to write were the ones that involved a middle-aged bodyguard named Wonsik. He takes on a “guardian” and “mentor” role for the two main characters, especially Iseul. “Basically, you have these chaotic teens who are running [around] the Capitol and then there’s this very calm, stoic, ex-government official who kind of plays the mother hen role,” Hur explained with a smile. The inspiration for these scenes came from Hur’s love for her father. “I love my dad. I channeled all that energy into that character and his interaction with Iseul,” she said warmly.

A Crane Among Wolves Garners Attention

Hur has documented her journey as an author since the beginning of her ventures into exploring and writing about Korean history. With her books’ popularity increasing with each one she promotes, A Crane Among Wolves garnered a large amount of attention from people who didn’t know about her books prior to her posting videos. Posting was actually a daunting process for Hur before she got the hang of it. Now she has accumulated a following of those who love her writing and her books after posting almost every day on her Instagram and TikTok. 

“I find that with making Instagram reels and TikToks it’s actually just fun quick content that I could just make in a few seconds. Those have been doing enough to promote my books and so it’s actually been pretty fun to promote Crane,” Hur said while talking about the process of self-promoting. Hur enjoys showing her creativity through making content such as “mini movie trailers” for her books. “Usually I don’t have a very positive experience with marketing and promoting my book […] With Crane, it’s been very different in the sense that the door has opened up to me,” she added. A Crane Among Wolves has officially spread its wings out into the world on May 14. 

The book is now available for purchase on Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Indigo, Barnes & Noble, and Books-A-Million. Make sure to follow Hur for more Korean historical fiction writing and research facts on her Instagram, TikTok, and website!

Interested in some outlandish book recommendations? Check out our picks of four books by AAPI authors set in hell here!

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