The Lucky Gourd Shop is a novel representing obstacles that family backgrounds may cause, difficulties in assimilation, and how events out of our control can make up our future. It is a story of how three children, born in South Korea from a very impoverished home, and how their flawed family and environment has affected them negatively. However, these handicaps were also motivations for them to push harder and live a brand new life by coming into a foreign country and meeting those who can truly support them. The imagery that allows the reader to be in each scenery, the emotional empathy that they feel throughout the story, all adds up to curiosity and inspiration.