Obama favourite: First author announced for Adelaide Writers’ Week
The first big name on next year’s Writers’ Week lineup has been revealed, one of Barack Obama’s favourite authors whose award-winning book was adapted for the screen.
South Korean American author Min Jin Lee, known for her best-selling novel Pachinko, has been revealed as the featured author for Adelaide Writers’ Week’s 2027 opening night.
Lee will join The Monthly editor Michael Williams for a discussion about her new novel American Hagwon.
She is the first author officially announced to join the festival’s 2027 lineup under the new leadership of Director Rosemarie Milsom, who was appointed after the resignation of Louise Adler earlier this year in the midst of controversy.
Milsom was appointed in April, after the most turbulent chapter in the literary festival’s history.
The 2026 Adelaide Writers’ Week was cancelled after the Adelaide Festival Board decided to pull Palestinian-Australian author Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah from the programme, leading to the collapse of the nation’s largest literary festival and a mass boycott by an estimated 180 authors.
Abdel-Fattah received an apology from the Adelaide Writers’ Week board, and was invited to attend next year’s event – though it is not yet confirmed if she would attend.
Milsom today announced Lee as the first author on her 2027 lineup.
“Pachinko introduced millions of readers around the world to a history that had too often been overlooked,” Milsom said about her book following the lives of a Korean immigrant family living in Japan from 1910 to 1989.
“With American Hagwon, Min Jin Lee has again created an expansive family story, but one that feels urgently connected to the questions many of us are asking about what constitutes a good life and what we are prepared to sacrifice for the people we love.”
American Hagwon follows the Koh family after the 1997 Asian financial crisis changes their lives, sending them from Seoul to Sydney and eventually to California.
It is Lee’s first novel since Pachinko and her third exploring the Korean diaspora. The title references a hagwon; Korea’s private academies that are key to the country’s competitive academic culture.
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Pachinko, released in 2017, was a finalist for the National Book Award and was listed as number fifteen on the New York Times’ 100 Best Books of the 21st Century. Pachinko was recommended by former US President Barack Obama in his list of favourite books and the novel was adapted into an Apple TV series in 2022.
It is named after a popular Japanese game similar to pinball machines, which Obama said was “a captivating book I read at the suggestion of a young staffer on my team”and a “powerful story about resilience and compassion”.
Lee will appear in conversation with Williams at Adelaide Town Hall on Friday 26 February 2027 as part of her national book tour.
More authors on the Writers’ Week lineup will be revealed in late October, alongside the Adelaide Festival’s 2027 program. The full Adelaide Writers’ Week program will be released in January.
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