In a village in early-twentieth-century Korea, a widow lives with her young daughter. As the girl, Ehwa, begins to flower into womanhood, her mother meets a traveling artist and begins imagining a different future than the one that's been laid out for her. But she must also help her daughter learn that relations between men and women aren't exactly the same as relations between "stinky poo trees" — that is, ginkgoes.

A quiet story of yearning in daily life, The Color of Earth is the first volume in an acclaimed trilogy by Korean comics master Kim Dong Hwa. A beautifully drawn manhwa, or Korean manga, The Color of Earth has just been published in English for the first time by First Second Books. Vulture is proud to present a sixteen-page excerpt from the book.