Pachinko: Book vs. Series
Created by Soo Hugh, Pachinko (2022) adapts Min Jin Lee’s 2017 novel. Sunja’s move from Korea to Japan begins a family story that follows later generations’ struggles with work, belonging, and discrimination.
From Books Adapted
Which books each season covers
Both seasons draw from different ends of the same book
Min Jin Lee tells the family’s story in chronological order. The series moves back and forth between generations, bringing Solomon’s adult life into the story long before the book reaches it.
| Season | Book adapted | How much it covers |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pachinko | Sunja’s childhood, marriage and move to Japan, with the earlier story reaching 1938. It also draws on Solomon’s story near the end of the book, set in 1989, and adds original material. |
| 2 | Pachinko | Continues Sunja’s earlier life from 1945 through 1951, including her sons’ youth. Solomon’s story continues in 1989. Both periods include changes and additions to the book. |
| A guide, not an exact match: shows move scenes and storylines between books and seasons. | ||
The adaptation remains unfinished. More of Noa and Mozasu’s adult lives remains in the book; reaching Solomon’s generation does not mean the intervening story has all been adapted.
A third season has not been officially announced. Soo Hugh has discussed finishing the story in three seasons, but that plan is not a confirmed order.
What changed from the book
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Hansu’s earthquake story was written for the series
Season one’s seventh episode leaves the main timelines to follow the young Hansu through the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. The book does not give him this extended origin story.
Hugh said she needed to understand the past that had shaped him. She also deliberately delayed that explanation. Showing it immediately after Hansu’s betrayal of Sunja would have invited sympathy for him before Sunja had space to respond. Placing it near the end of the season kept that background from softening his introduction and created a break before the earlier storyline jumps from 1931 to 1938.
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Noa directs his confrontation at a different parent
In the book, Noa confronts Sunja after discovering that Hansu is his biological father. The series gives that confrontation to Hansu instead.
Noa then visits his mother without revealing what he knows. His departure still follows the discovery, but Sunja receives an affectionate farewell before learning he has disappeared. Hugh said she preferred that gentler goodbye between mother and son to the confrontation in the novel.
About the book and the series
- Author
- Min Jin Lee
- Year
- 2017
- Pages
- 544Buy book
- Audiobook length
- 17 hr 48 minGet audiobook
- Narrator
- Sandra Oh, Min Jin Lee
Pregnant by a married man in Japanese-occupied Korea, Sunja accepts a young minister’s offer of marriage and moves with him to Osaka. Making a home there requires work, help from relatives, and compromises that reach into her sons’ lives. Across four generations, her family pursues education, business, and belonging in a country that continues to treat them as outsiders.
- Creator
- Soo Hugh
- Writer
- Soo Hugh
- Year
- 2022
- Seasons
- 2
- Episodes
- 16
- Network
- Apple TV
- Cast
- Yuh-Jung Youn, Lee Minho, Minha Kim, Jin Ha
- Genre
- Drama
- IMDb
- View on IMDb
Young Sunja leaves occupied Korea to build a household in Japan, where work and family ties offer limited protection from discrimination. Decades later, her grandson Solomon returns from America for a business deal that asks him to use the background he has spent years trying to outgrow. Moving between their lives, the series follows a family whose efforts to secure a future carry costs across generations.
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