Cursed Bunny

Nope.

I couldn’t get myself into it at all as much as I love this genre?? The only story that stood out to me was the one with the gold and the twins

haunting parables about trauma, abuse, and power. i found her pieces about sexual trauma & exploitation (the embodiment & snare) to be the strongest of the entire collection. really enjoyable.

This collection reminded me of Peter Carey's early short stories. Eerie, unsettling stories written in a straightfoward fashion. The final entry, 'Reunion' will stay with me for a long time, I think.

That was…depressing. I’m not really sure if there was meant to be an overarching theme, but it was a pretty nihilistic one if there was. There is certainly a lot of striking imagery, which is why I am not rating this lower, but I cannot really relate to whatever the author ia trying to say (maybe something about being at the mercy of fate/other people’s desires?).

Cursed Bunny was the July read for the Sword and Laser podcast. This book is a collection of short stories originally written in Korean and then translated to English. The stories cover a variety of genres/themes, although most of them land somewhere in the horror/fantasy/sci-fi zone. They are all creepy and dark in some way.

I have to say this was not really for me. Intellectually I can appreciate the work and the message of many of the stories, and a couple of them did grab me. Many of the other stories, though, my response was something like: “Huh. That was weird.” This would be a great choice for a literature class (I know there are lots of interesting metaphors hanging out in there!) - but not something I would just pick up for fun. Your mileage may vary, though! If stories of talking feces and murderous lamps seem up your alley- this could be the book for you!

Well this is a weird and wonderful little collection which I'll be thinking about for a long time. It's definitely got more horror elements than I'm usually comfortable with, but I think it's a prime example of using genre to explore the way we function in society. "The Embodiment" in particular is going to stick with me, I feel. It's almost Kafka-esque in its surreality, and the translation, while pretty sparse, serves the subject really well. An awesome collection if you have both a strong heart and stomach.

It was interesting once you got past the ick factors. I don't know if I would have picked it up if it wasn't a book club pick.

DNF. Made it through 1.5 stories and could see how she was using the body horror to make very pointed and clear observations on women and life. I just couldn't get through it at this point.

So spooky and twisted that I couldn't put it down. Everyone should read it.

Best short stories:
- The Head
- The Embodiment
- Snare

3.5

As someone who dipped their toes into Korean fiction for the first time with this book, let me tell you, this was an absolute trip.

It took me longer than expected to get through these short stories, but still, I couldn't put it down. I really had taken my time to absorb every detail. Maybe it was the translation by Anton Hur. Let's just say, he did a fantastic job at it. The writing flowed smoothly, which is no small feat when you're dealing with the kind of eerie and absurd situations Chung throws at you. Speaking of eerie and absurd, that's the perfect way to describe most of these stories.

I may have a newfound appreciation for body horror. If you're squeamish, maybe this collection isn't for you especially the first two stories. So naturally, my favorites are “The Head,” “The Embodiment”, and the namesake, “Cursed Bunny.” These stories are still living in my brain. Of course, not every story hit the mark. “The Frozen Finger,” “Goodbye My Love,” and a couple of others just didn't do it for me.

So yeah, if you're looking for something different, something quick to pass the time, and something that will stay with you long after you finish the last page, then this book might just be the bizarre adventure you crave.

3.5 stars.

Had some stories I really liked, no stories I hated, but a lot of stories that I was just okay with. Not a bad collection by any means but it suffers from the fact that I compare all short story collections I read now to Ken Liu's The Hidden Girl and other stories.

My favorite stories from this collection were:
- The Embodiment (that ending was jaw-dropping❗️)
- Reunion
- Goodbye, My Love

Deeply unnerving short story collection. I'm not really a collection guy, but this was a solid (and disturbing!) one.

This was a rollercoaster.
Started VERY strong, ended very strong. Lots of fluctuation in between.
Overall, nicely done.

This one was truly a mixed bag for me, a few of the stories were fantastic and I couldn't get enough of them and a couple were just good and a couple more were of the “eh okay” variety. I really liked the writing style.

“Uzun zaman önce, zincirin mağara duvarına çarpmasıyla ortaya çıkan minik kıvılcımı düşündü. Göğün devasa karanlığında kapana kısılmış biri, bunca yıldızı yaratmak için zincirlerini hayal dahi edilemeyecek kadar büyük bir duvara vurmuş olmalıydı. Bunları yardım istemek için mi yapmıştı, yoksa karanlık boşluğa katlanabilmek için mi? Bilmek imkansızdı. Zincirlerini duvara vurma sebebi her ne olursa olsun, tıpkı bir zamanlar yanından geçen böceğin kendisine yaptığı gibi bu, kapana kısılmış kişiye kayıtsız kaldı. “

These were so weird and beautiful! I loved Chung's writing style, the sparse and unornamented descriptions, and the lessons in the stories. A couple were too slow paced and dragged, but most of them were exquisite.

Loved the some of the stories such as The Head, the Embodiment, Cursed Bunny, Snare and Goodbye, My Love. Stories I mentioned are all short, sweet and got to the point and really dragged me into the story. The rest were just lengthy and repetitive and lost interest as the stories went on but wouldn't stop me from recommending this book to people as it's my own opinion. Overall good book

This collection of short stories really deserves its nomination for the International Booker.
Absurd, often frankly horrific and very dark, these stories draw on phantasy, horror and twisted folk tales, but are firmly rooted in the concerns of our modern, capitalist and patriarchal world and its very real horrors.
And Anton Hur's translation from Korean is nothing short of masterful.

This book is composed of 10 short horror stories:

The Head: this one follows a woman who suddenly witnesses a head pop up out of her toilet that starts calling her “mom”. This woman has no idea who this head belongs to and what they want. She then goes on a mission to remove this head from her life, but things don't really go to plan. It is a very gross story, so definitely not one to read while eating. It was in my opinion, very unique and such a strong story to start off with.

The Embodiment: in this story we follow a woman who somehow gets pregnant while being on birth control and the doctors tell her it's because she was on it for “too long”. In order for her baby to be born normal she needs to find a man who will be willing to give her his sperm. This one was very bizarre, and to be honest didn't really understand it (this will be a reoccurring thought...)

Cursed Bunny: there's a family who get paid to create cursed objects. There's a set of rules they have to follow to avoid disaster. The reasoning behind these rules is revealed through the main character's reminiscing grandfather. I really enjoyed this one, loved the message about revenge and how it doesn't just affect the targeted person but innocent people as well.

The Frozen Finger: a woman has woken up in a car that's about to drown, she has no idea where she is and what is happening. The only person there with her is this other woman who tries to help her. But nothing is what it seems. This one was chilling, I think I understood it all but there's a part of me who is still just as confused as this main character. The best part of this one is how atmospheric it is.

Snare: a man find a rabbit wounded in the woods, it isn't the fact that she can talk that drew this mans interest, it's the fact that her blood is made out of gold. How far is this man willing to go in order to maintain his new found riches? Extremely far I'll tell you that. This one is the darkest story of all of them and very fairy tale like. I would have thought this one belonged to the Grim Brother's fairy tale collection if I didn't know any better. By far my favorite of the bunch, even had a nightmare after reading this one.

Goodbye, My Love: ah, now we are getting into what I refer to “the shift” of this short story collection. Our main character work for this robot company and is responsable with turning them on and making sure they work properly. These robots you ask? they are suppose to be human like and basically help their owners. But we all know how these types of stories turn out... very black mirror but without the horror.

Scars: this one I don't even think I can explain, as I didn't quite understand it. A man lives a cave where this things he refers to as “it” comes feed from his body whenever it feels like. He doesn't remember life before the cave, how he got there or what this thing is. It is creepy, but personally I was quite confused. This is the longest story out of all of them and I got bored a bit.

Home Sweet Home: a woman and her family moves into a new building, and are tasked to renovate it. But creepy things keep happening. Another one that I didn't really get, which is why my description of the book is very basic. Not very scary and the story flew over my head. This one was my least favorite.

Ruler of the Winds and Sands: a blind prince is born due to a curse that was placed upon his family. When he becomes of age to marry, his father sets him up with a princess from another kingdom. She falls in love with him and decides to go to the person who was responsable for this cursed to ask him to lift it. This one was more fantasy than horror, as there was 0 horror elements to it. Quite enjoyable though, just wanted more of it as I felt like it ended right when things where getting interesting.

Reunion: I had to go back and check if I had read this one because I couldn't remember what it was about...I think this speaks for itself. A Korean woman moves to Poland where she meets this man who is very troubled. They bond over the fact they can see ghosts and eventually fall for one another. Again, not scary and is heavily focused on trauma. Personally wasn't a huge fan of this one either as it didn't really keep my interest.

As you can see, I really enjoyed the first 5 stories, but from story 6 onwards I felt like the mood of the book shifts from dark, horror, gruesome stories to a sci-fi, fantasy ball of confusion. Maybe I'm too dumb to understand some of the ones from the second half, but I just didn't enjoy them and they put me in a reading slump. I still recommend reading the first 5 stories especially “snare” because my god chef's kiss. If you like fantasy with a bit of horror, you may like the second half, but if you're looking for pure horror, you may be disappointed.

When the first story introduces us to a formless mass made of fallen out hair, feces and toilet paper that utters the word “Mother!” before being flushed down the toilet — you're not exactly sure what you're in for. This collection of short stories / modern day fairytales benefit from the stellar translation of Anton Sur and are by turns hilarious, horrifying and more than a little absurd. Bora Chung walks a fine line that balances all these elements and arrives at something unexpected — not always mind you, one of the stories fell completely flat for me — but there's always going to be hits and misses with a collection like this. Chung is otherwise throwing twist upon twist and I love her bent toward horror, the very Korean theme of revenge, and the price of human greed.