‘The strange and everyday are melded in these startling and original tales … Cursed Bunny is [Chung’s] first book to be translated into English, and hopefully not the last.’
Connie Biewald, San Francisco Chronicle
‘While the stories in Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung blend elements of horror, fantasy and the surreal, each is viscerally rooted in the real fears and pressures of everyday life. Chung’s genre-defying collection is translated with verve and evident relish by Anton Hur, who shifts effortlessly from playful to harrowing.’
International Booker Prize judges
‘Chung brings together 10 stories that are frightening, fantastical, and oddly funny … there is a glinting humour to Chung’s work and a glee at telling a good story well, no matter how terrifying. Cursed Bunny is absurdist horror with a feminist slant, and Hur’s translation deftly follows its every turn.’
PEN America
‘If you were the kind of child who was enthralled by Scary Stories to Read in the Dark, Bora Chung writes for you. Like the work of Carmen Maria Machado and Aoko Matsuda, Chung’s stories are so wonderfully, blisteringly strange and powerful that it's almost impossible to put Cursed Bunny down. In short, this collection may, in fact, be a cursed object in the best possible way.’
Kelly Link, bestselling author of Get In Trouble
‘Like a family in a home, fantastic stories gather together in this book. The stories not only take their revenge, but also love you, and comfort you. You’ll end up completely endeared to this fascinating collection!’
Kyung-sook Shin, New York Times bestselling author of Please Look After Mom and Violets
‘Bora Chung’s Cursed Bunny mines those places where what we fear is true and what is true meet and separate and re-meet. The resulting stories are indelible. Haunting, funny, gross, terrifying and yet when we reach the end, we just want more.’
Alexander Chee, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel
‘Cool, brilliantly demented K-horror — just the way I like it!’
Ed Park, author of Personal Days
‘A collection of exquisitely crafted, spooky and unnerving tales that haunted me long after reading. Each story is a macabre gem, shot through with visceral horror, wry humour, and subtly profound insights on human nature. These stories convey how the traumas and transgressions of the past, individual and collective, and erupt into the present, distorting and eroding our perception of reality. Bora Chung is an amazingly inventive and daring writer. I will revisit these stories whenever I need a reminder of how fresh and vital prose can be.’
Kate Folk, author of Out There
‘Disturbing, chilling, wrenching, and absolute genius. I wanted Chung to write a story about a reader getting a deep look inside her fantastic swirling mind. I had to take breaks and gulps of air before plunging back into each story. Magnetic, eerie, immensely important.’
Frances Cha, author of If I Had Your Face
‘Fables of frightening moral clarity told in calm, bell-like prose, Cursed Bunny aims to unsettle. It’s as assured and brilliant as a nightmare. With an unflinching gaze and a sly humour, Chung has built a world both unfamiliar and eerily familiar, whose truths echo into our own. The indelible work of a master.’
Shruti Swamy, author of The Archer and A House is a Body
‘Whether borrowing from fable, folktale, speculative fiction, science fiction, or horror, Chung’s stories corkscrew toward devastating conclusions — bleak, yes, but also wise and honest about the nightmares of contemporary life. Don't read this book while eating — but don’t skip these unflinching, intelligent stories, either.’
Kirkus Reviews, starred review
‘[Chung’s] glorious anglophone debut, enabled by award-winning Anton Hur, is poised to shock and delight. Bizarrely enigmatic, Chung’s collection proves irresistible.’Booklist, starred review
‘Chung debuts with a well-crafted and horrifying collection of dark fairy tales, stark revenge fables, and disturbing body horror … Clever plot twists and sparkling prose abound. Chung’s work is captivating and terrifying.’
Publishers Weekly
‘Bora Chung soars with a provocative collection of stories … remarkable … The 10 stories are beyond imagination: breathtaking, wild, crazy, the most original fiction I have ever encountered … each more astounding than the last.’
Louisa Ermelino, Publishers Weekly
‘Bora Chung’s stories succeed at being deeply visceral experiences that do what the best fairy tales do: convey the unspeakable in a way that is nevertheless collectively understood … perfect for fans of Bong Joon-ho's films or Helen Oyeyemi’s fiction.’
Alice Martin, Shelf Awareness
‘This short story collection is like a car crash you can't look away from: grotesque in the best way … Each story is fantastically unique, and unlike anything I've ever read before.’
Kirby Beaton, Buzzfeed
‘If you want a spooky set of stories that will crawl under your skin and burrow into your marrow and stay there forever, Chung’s collection is a freaky, unforgettable outing. There’s a folkloric quality to this collection, like these are urban legends that have finally been put to paper.’
Wired Magazine
‘Strange, surreal and sometimes shocking … The collection can admittedly feel relentlessly bleak at times, disturbing and frightening but with a staunch moral compass … [W]ith Hur’s crisp clean translation of Chung’s effective, simple language, it is hard to stop reading … Chung is peeling back our eye lids, holding them open, forcing us to witness nightmarish horrors of the body and mind, fables that inspire fear; a brutal reality that is just undeniable.’
Mahvesh Murad, tor.com
‘These short stories blend the genres of magical realism, horror, fantasy and folklore … A series of nightmares is one way to describe Bora Chung’s cursed tales … Other stories read like a series of cautionary tales against capitalist greed … What follows is an unfolding of further gruesome events that lead to murder, cannibalism and incest. What do you call a nightmare you can’t wake up from? A living hell?’
Fi Churchman, Art Review
‘What made this book truly transcendental was the sense of absolute dread that many of its stories summoned. Chung’s work fits neatly beside that of Brian Evenson and Kelly Link — cerebral fiction that might give you nightmares.’
Tobias Carroll, Words Without Borders
‘This is an interesting, strange, and horrific world summed up in ten short stories … ‘Resonates’ is the word that hangs in the air at the end of each story.’
Barnes&Noble
‘This Korean debut collection is a stunner. The stories included are absurdly unique, delightfully monstrous, horrifically insightful and chillingly satisfying.’
Ms. Magazine
‘[A] get-under-your-skin collection.’
LitHub
‘Addictively bizarre … bone-chilling.’
BookReporter
‘Nothing concentrates the mind like Chung’s terrors, which will shrivel you to a bouillon cube of your most primal instincts.’
Rhoda Feng, Vulture
‘Chung’s genre-defying collection breathes life into literary horror as the stories incorporate common fears and societal flaws with elements of the fantastic in the most chilling ways. The tales in Cursed Bunny will draw readers in with familiar themes and genre tropes and leave them pleasantly surprised, if not disturbed by the monsters within.’
The West Trade Review
‘A unique and chilling collection.’
We Are Bookish
‘Translated from the Korean by Anton Hur, the ten stories in Cursed Bunny dive headfirst into the surreal — a pregnant woman is forced to identify the father of her unborn child or face unspeakable consequences, another woman’s bodily waste comes back to haunt her, and in another story a cursed lamp brings misfortune to anyone who touches it. Bora Chung blends genre and form to tackle the very real horrors of big tech, capitalism, and the patriarchy.’
Longlist announcement for the 2023 National Book Award for Translated Literature
