Cho Nam Joo

Cho Nam-joo (born in 1978) is a Korean writer and author. She is best known for her 2016 novel Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, which has sold more than a million copies and is often credited with propelling a feminist movement in South Korea.

Nam-joo was born in South Korea in 1978. She grew up in Bucheon and moved to Seoul with her family at the age of five. During her mother's pregnancy with Cho, her father promised her uncle—who had five daughters—that if the baby was born a boy, he would gift the child to the uncle to raise. Ultimately, she was raised by her own parents.

As a child, Nam-joo loved reading, but she didn't have money for books, and her local public libraries in the poor outskirts of Seoul where she lived were barely functioning. She borrowed the few books she could and reread those stories again and again.

Nam-joo attended all-girls' school for middle school, high school, and college. She graduated from Ewha Womans University with a sociology degree. Nam-joo currently lives in Seoul with her family.