prolog
When everyone was leaving, I came out
Cafeteria commotion
Second school start
proposal
Abandoned Child Ghost Story
Steal that
Shin Ji-hye
Criminal Ending
designation
A child met in the rainy season
Share house
The rest of the class
Come play at my house
book thief
A child like me
Next time, let's definitely meet
Another angle
ugliness
The hardest thing about being a student
It gets tangled easily and unravels easily.
Flashback Somi's Story
Nobody knows
Flashback Duhong's Story
23
I'm going to you
That phenomenon
incense
Epilogue

Author's Note

It's a fun way to imagine things we've probably all had at least once.
A work with distinct personality and awareness of issues.
- Judges (Kang Su-hwan, Lee Da-hye, Cheon Seon-ran, Kakao Page, Changbi)

A captivating story of characters who empathize with each other through material hardship and inner wandering, struggling and growing together.
- YA Jury

The name of the place I stay is 'House'
Other people call this place a school

Before starting his night self-study class, Junyoung, a third-year high school student, maintains an awkward silence amidst the chattering children.
Friends are busy talking about recent incidents at school where books have gone missing or things have been rearranged.
Junyoung laughs at the children who are making a fuss about him, calling him a "book thief" and opens his notebook instead of his workbook.
And write a sentence on top of it.

I think class 6 would be good today.
I am the book thief the children are talking about.
―Page 20 of the text

The identity of the 'book thief' that appeared in the rumor was none other than Junyoung.
Junyoung had recently gone back to school alone after his father disappeared and his house went bankrupt.
Even among the studying kids, he is obsessed with calculating the cost of graduating from high school.
Junyoung names the school 'House' and hopes to find a 'home' where he can settle down someday.


“Get out of my house”
There wasn't just one person living in my 'house'

Student body president Shin Ji-hye notices Jun-young secretly going to and from school at night and approaches him.
Shin Ji-hye offers Jun-young the key to the school storage room in exchange for keeping Jun-young's secret and asks him to steal the notebook of the top student in the school.
Junyoung, who was debating whether to accept the offer, decided to move into the school warehouse for the time being and live at the school completely during the summer when the rainy season begins.
Junyoung, who has decided on a place to stay, calms his anxious heart.
Until Junyoung discovered a warning note left in the warehouse while he was away.

"what's this?"
I heard thunder even though it wasn't raining.
Much further down the graffiti I'd seen last time, there was graffiti that definitely hadn't been there before.
Get out of my house
That kid is a book thief.
―Page 139

A few days before discovering the graffiti, Junyoung heard unidentified footsteps at school in the middle of the night.
Could the owner of those terrifying footsteps have left a warning in the warehouse? Could it be that more books have disappeared than those Jun-young stole, and that another person is present in the school? Jun-young freezes in the face of the warning, claiming he's been intruding on his living space.
Now, Junyoung faces multiple crises: finding out who this person is who is making him uncomfortable, successfully completing the entrance exam and graduation without anyone finding out he is living at school, and also having to consider Shin Ji-hye's proposal.
The novel gradually draws to a conclusion as the stories of 'Duhong', a friend who worries about Junyoung, 'Somi', a junior who wants to leave home like Junyoung, and 'Jihye', who is not sure whether she is trying to help Junyoung or use him, intertwine.
Will Junyoung be able to overcome all the crises and find a safe haven?

“Where are you now?”
Children struggling to find answers

"Somehow School Became Home" starts with a unique setting and imagination of a teenager living at school for several days without being caught and with no one caring about him, and represents the "unstable mind with no one to rely on" of a teenager.
As we reach the end of adolescence, a period of uncertainty, we all find ourselves constantly wondering where we are, where we are going, and whether we have made the right choice about where we should go.
Author Kim Yoon captures the heart of a teenager who cannot give a proper answer to those who constantly ask, "Where are you now?" and portrays it in a mysterious story.
The novel vividly depicts the process in which children with no place to stay and no place to rest their hearts, each carrying their own anxieties, finally become a weak fence for each other.
Junyoung and his friends are not perfect, but they share pieces of themselves with each other.
The sense of loneliness that appears from the beginning of the novel is never satisfied.
But Junyoung and his friends vaguely realize that if they put these uneven pieces together, the cracks will one day be filled and they will stand strong.
This novel is a gift that is essential for young people who feel lonely and anxious about their present and future.

I'm okay with being lost for a while now.
―Page 257

Character introduction

“From now on, this is my home.” ―Junyoung
A child who started living at school one day.
Create a rumor about a 'book thief' within the school.

“The key is simply the price you paid for listening to my suggestion.” ―Jihye
Student body president.
After noticing Junyoung coming and going from the night school, he hands over the storage key and makes a suggestion.

“I’m leaving home.” —Somi
A junior at the high school that Junyoung attends.
I want to leave home and go somewhere.

"Junyoung, are you going to play basketball during lunch?" - Duhong
A classmate of Junyoung.
It may seem pointless, but he worries about Junyoung more than anyone else.

"Then would you like to hear my story? I have a suggestion." ―Dobin
Junyoung, Duhong's friend.
After explaining his plan, he disappeared without a trace.

“No one will know I was here.” ―???
An unknown person living at school.
He leaves graffiti in the warehouse that says 'Get out of my house'.

“That’s what adults are supposed to do.
By the way, have you eaten?” - Homeroom teacher
Junyoung and Duhong's homeroom teacher.
Although he appears indifferent, he takes care of his students.

Among the judges' comments

The award-winning novel, "How School Became Home," is a story about a high school student who ends up hiding out at school.
This is a work that humorously portrays the kind of imagination that anyone would have had at least once, and you will anxiously follow along to see how the protagonist, who has few choices, will navigate the situation.
Among the original works, this one was the most revised and had a clearer sense of the problem, dealing with the suffering of children in school, such as running away from home and preparing for college entrance exams.
- Judges (Kang Su-hwan, Lee Da-hye, Cheon Seon-ran, Kakao Page, Changbi)