Complete at sixty episodes (chapters), Dear Hongrang is a journey. Apart from flashbacks, the prologue, and the epilogue, the entire story takes place over one brief summer during the Joseon era of Korean history, detailing one of the truest examples of “you reap what you sow” I've read in recent memory. Dark, bitter, and intermittently hopeful, Dokjin and Hottu's adaptation of Jang Dahye's original novel pulls you in, even if none of those flavors are your preferred reading, making it nearly impossible to put down.

The story takes place during the last summer of the merchant house of Min/Shim (Lord Shim is the son-in-law of the prestigious Min merchant group). For decades, the Min name was synonymous with wealth and success, which ultimately led Lord Shim to join forces with them. His original plan was to be adopted by Lord Min, who only had a daughter, but when that daughter fell in love with him, Lord Shim was forced to marry her, at the cost of throwing over his beloved. Lady Min proved to be a petty, spiteful person, the full depth of which we don't truly understand until late in the series. When she was unable to become pregnant, Lord Shim was allowed to take a concubine, by whom he had a daughter, Jaeyi. Lady Min not only gave Jaeyi a name written with inauspicious characters, but she tormented the girl mercilessly…and when she finally did have a son and that son vanished at age eight, her hatred of Jaeyi only grew worse.

The story proper begins when, after years of fruitless searching, a viable young man claiming to be the lost Hongrang appears. Lady Min immediately embraces him, and Lord Shim is, apparently, willing to do so as well. But Jaeyi is unconvinced, as is the “placeholder” son Lord Shim adopted in the interim, Mujin. The lines are quickly drawn for the plot to unfold, with one of the central focuses being the relationships between Jaeyi, Hongrang, and Mujin. If you're a sucker for a twisted, tragic love story, rest assured that Dear Hongrang understands the assignment as the story plays with various forms of forbidden love, lost love, and painful yearning.

That, however, isn't the real focus of the plot. At its heart, Dear Hongrang is about curses coming home to roost and getting what you deserve. Hongrang is the most interesting character in this regard. The more we learn about his past, the more tragic he becomes; a lost soul who never felt welcome anywhere and who was enough on the fringes of society to slip past everyone's notice. The most defining period of his life was when he was forced to serve as a “prop” for Prince Hanpyeong, a role he ended up in because of a devil's bargain the prince made with Lord Shim. Hongrang's story is, on the surface, a revenge narrative, because what he was made to suffer during his time with the prince is both stomach-churning and unspeakably cruel, as is how Lord Shim seeks to prolong that torture for his benefit. If you dig beneath the surface, he, Jaeyi, and Mujin all share the same direct desire: to be loved for who they are.

Each of these three suffers in ways that are similar to each other and yet unique to themselves. Jaeyi has been the target of Lady Min's murderous desires since she was born, suffering the woman's ire for merely existing. Mujin is in a similar position (down to the unlucky characters in the name Lady Min gives him), but with the added burden of having been sold by his own father to Lord Shim, a hurt he never gets over. Hongrang has existed as property for his entire life, sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively, and has never known anyone who truly cared for him. Both of the young men see an opportunity in Jaeyi, which in itself devalues her by casting her simply as their savior rather than a woman in her own right who has suffered as well. Mujin and Hongrang seem to feel that if they can marry Jaeyi, they can know peace and happiness, and Mujin convinces himself that if they wed and he takes her out of the Shim house, he'll be saving her, too. But this is mostly Mujin thinking about what would make him happy while trying to build the family he lost when his father sold him. Hongrang has a slightly more realistic understanding of Jaeyi, at least once he realizes that she's hardly the pampered daughter of a doting, wealthy family. Still, his ardor is hampered by his revenge mission and his self-destructive tendencies.

As you may have guessed, Dear Hongrang comes with a wealth of content warnings, and that can make it difficult to read at times. It doesn't feel like torture porn because everything is followed through to its natural conclusion. That doesn't always make it happy, and this is one of those stories you want to be in the right mood to read, because it hits hard. It's full of tragedies, large and small, and some elements won't feel right to readers more used to American-style stories with happy endings and threads neatly gathered up in pretty bows. That said, it's a solid story with good characters (or at least characters you love to hate), and the way everything is woven together is, if not masterful, then at least well done. Manta's translation is professional and smooth, and I was shocked to read the author's note at the end and learn that this is Hottu's first work; their art is polished and beautiful.

With a recent drama adaptation available on Netflix as of this writing, Dear Hongrang is an easy recommendation for fans of intense historical fiction. Part revenge story, part tragedy, part lesson in reaping what you sow, it's engrossing and impressive. If we're lucky, the original novel will get an English translation to go alongside the manhwa and the drama, but Dokjin's adaptation is more than enough.