Bloomsbury presents I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Sehee, read by Jully Lee.

The South Korean runaway bestseller, debut author Baek Sehee's intimate therapy memoir, as recommended by BTS.

Psychiatrist: So how can I help you?

Me: I don’t know, I’m—what’s the word—depressed? Do I have to go into detail?

Baek Sehee is a successful young social media director at a publishing house when she begins seeing a psychiatrist about her—what to call it?—depression? She feels persistently low, anxious, endlessly self-doubting, but also highly judgemental of others. She hides her feelings well at work and with friends, performing the calmness her lifestyle demands. The effort is exhausting, overwhelming and keeps her from forming deep relationships. This can't be normal. But if she's so hopeless, why can she always summon a yen for her favourite street food: the hot, spicy rice cake, tteokbokki? Is this just what life is like?

Recording her dialogues with her psychiatrist over a twelve-week period, and expanding on each session with her own reflective micro-essays, Baek begins to disentangle the feedback loops, knee-jerk reactions and harmful behaviours that keep her locked in a cycle of self-abuse. Part memoir, part self-help book, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is an audiobook to keep close and to listen to in times of darkness. It will appeal to anyone who has ever felt alone or unjustified in their everyday despair.