Written by Sun-mi Hwang and Illustrated by Kim Dong Sung


Infinite world of playing house

It will be the world of playing house if children who are taken care of by in the environment created by their parents want to take action based on his own will and imagination in the most independent way. Trying to manage my own house without any directions…… The world where I can invite guests and where we all can enjoy meal even if meals were made of things that we actually cannot eat. Therefore, the writer welcomes everyone by opening up all the possibilities in this world. This world is made by imagination but also exists in reality at the same time. Whether they are living creatures or non-living creatures, all things are given their own new characteristics. However, only children can be masters of this world. Adults as parents can be guests, but cannot be masters.
The writers, Hwang Sun Mi and Kim, Dong Sung, deeply look into how this small world can be built up and disappear where the center is children. And they also created a precious and beautiful growing story experienced by the master of this world.
Outside the fences where rainbow appears
The main character, Yeon-Ji, leaves home to catch rainbow one day under the cool summer rain. She is only six years old, and this little girl has never been outside the fences of her village. However, this time, she decides to get out of her daily life as a 6-year-old child, who is ‘poor and bored’, and tries a new way out one day. While thinking of her older sister, who does not want to join her ‘playing house’ game, saying, ‘You should not believe adults. There might be fairies in grass,’ she escapes her well-organized village. She has missed the rainbow, but she meets Ji-O. Ji-O knows every corner of the grass filed as if she is at home. She looks different from Yeon-Ji. They both live in different environments and play differently. Ji-O might be the imaginary friend of Yeon-Ji, because she is somewhat unclearly described in this book. With Ji-O, Yeon-Ji begins to smell the scent of living grass, pick out some fruit, and invite real baby mouse and a fish into her playing house game. And when the master of this game, Yeon-Ji, recognizes this vibrantly living thing with her whole senses, all the invited guests get faded out and several years have passed suddenly.
When playing house is over

The writer, Hwang, sets out the milestone named ‘life’ at the end of this mysterious and dreamy world. Yeon Ji has finally realized her real own world at the moment she feels the pain of being alive in the world where all things are alive and can speak, even if no one teaches her any lessons. She has finally realized about her own living world.
Among illustrations of playing house, the atmosphere of summer rain, and its beauty and cruelty, the illustrator, Kim, has described the scenery of passing time. The yellow summer rain and the green nature are all over in this book, and it makes readers feel the natural time. Here, a baby mouse and a doll are asleep together and the playing house game begins in the thick summer bushes. The rainbow Yeon-Ji has missed lies behind a big leave, in the evening sunset, in her room while she is waiting for the rain to stop, and in her items of playing house game. Readers can be more intrigued by this book when they look for sweet and friendly eyes of illustrators in this picture book.