Cursed Bunny

Stories

By: Bora Chung, Anton Hur - translator

Narrated by: Greta Jung

SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE AND WINNER OF A PEN/HEIM TRANSLATION GRANT

"Cool, brilliantly demented K-horror—just the way I like it!" —Ed Park, author of Personal Days

A stunning, wildly original debut from a rising star of Korean literature—surreal, chilling fables that take on the patriarchy, capitalism, and the reign of big tech with absurdist humor and a (sometimes literal) bite.

From an author never before published in the United States, Cursed Bunny is unique and imaginative, blending horror, sci-fi, fairytales, and speculative fiction into stories that defy categorization. By turns thought-provoking and stomach-turning, here monsters take the shapes of furry woodland creatures and danger lurks in unexpected corners of everyday apartment buildings. But in this unforgettable collection, translated by the acclaimed Anton Hur, Chung’s absurd, haunting universe could be our own, illuminating the ills of contemporary society.

“The Head” follows a woman haunted by her own bodily waste. “The Embodiment” takes us into a dystopian gynecology office where a pregnant woman is told that she must find a father for her baby or face horrific consequences. Another story follows a young monster, forced into underground fight rings without knowing the force of his own power. The titular fable centers on a cursed lamp in the approachable shape of a rabbit, fit for a child’s bedroom but for its sinister capabilities.

No two stories are alike, and readers will be torn whether to race through them or savor Chung’s wit and frenetic energy on every page. Cursed Bunny is a book that screams to be read late into the night and passed on to the nearest set of hands the very next day.
©2022 Bora Chung (P)2022 Algonquin Books

Critic reviews

“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

“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

“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

Interesting writing, sleep-inducing narration.

They're fun stories, but the performance sounds like somebody reading an essay out loud in the flattest tone possible, and makes the language seem plain and simplistic even when it's not.

Strange, wonderful, and very existential

This is absolutely worth a read. What a unique collection of stories. I enjoyed the creativity and willingness to go there.

pretty good but a bit much

the stories are well written and the voice acting although a bit weird at times was good, the only reason that this book isn't higher is because there is a lot of themes it this book that I was not expecting, themes of rape, incest, and torcher, all make an appearance in this book and it was definitely a lot but other then that most of the stories were good.
if this is really not your thing I would avoid scars and snare these are the stories that these really present in so if you just skip these two I would really recommend this book as it does what it sets out to do well, be a grown up version of scary stories to tell in the dark and it was for the most part a fun listen.
but yeah skip scars for a lot of torcher, skip snare for rape and incest, and skip the head because it was just kind of weird and not that good.

Imaginative

Keeps your attention and keeps you guessing what could possibly happen next. Enjoyed the stories immensely.

I think I'll buy the book.

It's dark, poignant and strange but painfully beautiful. There's a lot of talk about non living beings but there's so much life in the stories.

wonderfully diverse collection

i was so impressed by all the different stories! very interesting to listen to, i was immersed.

Did not enjoy

Stories didnt make much sense to me, writing was mediocre. Wouldn’t recommend. I just didn’t really see a point in this book.

read by a robot

some interesting material ruined by the narrator. it sounds like a robot reciting script

Dark, disturbing...and possibly not returnable

This is an interesting collection. A few stories in, however, it became clear that it wasn't for me. I found it extremely disturbing -- violence, cruelty, torture, incest, etc. Even though there were more than 4 hours left in the book and I'd bought it with a credit, Audible would not allow me to return it. I'm assuming that the problem wasn't that I'd gotten too far into this title, but that I've returned "too many" titles that I didn't like once they got going. I have no idea what Audible's limits are about this, but I really don't think I abused the ability to return books I didn't like. Learn from my wasted credit: Don't get this if you are at all sensitive to cruelty, torture, and the like.

Wonder what an aborted fetus might do to get even?

As an 80 year old, I have had a difficult time spotting terrible books based on computer games, two in a row, unreadable.

Now Cursed Bunny, as it turns, based on "Womens Curse" get it. I didn't.

If you like allegories, you will love the first story about an abortion or possibly a miscarriage that survives in the sewer and comes back to get even.

The second story seemed to be about an endless menstruation. I remember one could reject a bad book. That dosen't seem to be a thing at this time.