Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung is a collection of 10 short stories. I will share a detailed book review of this masterpiece in this blog. The book was shortlisted for International Booker Prize in 2022 which is a pretty big deal!

Cursed Bunny has 10 short stories that use grotesque elements to explore human society. These stories are terrifying and bizarre but brilliant at the same time. The book has love, human relationships, power, sci-fi, magic, ghosts, monsters, sorcerers, prince and princess, kings and queens, and even victims of WWII. So it really is a complete package!

The Head is the first story in the book. It is about a woman who is haunted by a head in her toilet seat. Pretty creepy and eerie! The head is a creation of the woman as it is made up of her waste. Bora Chung adds really graphic descriptions of the head which is quite unsettling at times. The story can be read as a fight for survival by the head and the woman. It also deals with themes of mental stress and agony. The end is quite shocking. I was hooked from the first story.

The Embodiment is another creepy and weird story of a girl who is pregnant without having any physical relationship. Apparently, some birth control pills lead to complications and she gets pregnant. The doctors ask her to find a father for the child to complete its growth. The story shows how female existence is defined and judged by patriarchal standards. Again a very depressing and weird end!

Cursed Bunny is a strange and bizarre story of a man who has created a cursed bunny to ruin a businessman. The cursed object gone into the wrong hands destroys the lives of so many innocent people in the worst possible way. The story shows not only the effect of magic on victims but on the ones doing it all as well.

The Frozen Finger is a very weird tale, you can barely trust your own mind. A woman meets an accident and gets out of the car. She tries to find a way back to the world but really weird things start happening to her. She has a colleague with her who tells her different narratives of where they were going and what happened. The story is more like testing the human mind. Bora Chung adds a tiny shocking plot twist at the end as well that makes you rethink everything you have read.

Snare is my favorite story in the collection. A man finds a fox with golden blood and traps it. He keeps wounding it to get fresh gold. The miserable fox dies leaving a horrific curse behind. The curse consumes the entire family. This story has cannibalism, ince*st, murder, curse, ghosts, and every creepy thing that can send shivers up your spine. The family meets the most tragic horrible fate you can think of, it is a must-read!

Good bye, My Love is a sci-fi story about AI robots. The story shows the evil and cunning nature of machines that will soon take over the human world. Quite an interesting read. I do think it was quite plain compared to the other stories.

Scars is a very bizarre and violent tale of a boy who is sacrificed to a monster. The story is about his survival and how he fights back to save the people from the monster. Does he succeed? Read and find out. The story is very graphic in its depiction of torture and trauma. I felt it was a little bit dragged but it was good overall.

Home Sweet Home is a story of a woman trying her best to make both ends meet. Her husband cheats on her, every effort to make things work fails, but there is still hope! A weird hope in the basement of the building she has just bought.

Ruler of the Wind and Sands is a story about a princess who saves the prince. What happens next? The same that happens in every story! The prince does not deserve to be saved! There is a sorcerer, a floating ship, and curses. Bora Chunga sprinkles all the fantasy elements you can enjoy in a 20-minute read. I loved the ending.

Reunion is the last and the saddest story in Cursed Bunny. It is about war victims and their generations. The story is about the narrator and a man with a weird fetish. The focus of the story is on the futility of human life. It is also about trauma and troubling psychological conditions. There are ghosts but not the scary ones, the really sad and depressing ghosts who need an escape from the human world.

Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung is partially set in the real world and partially set in creepy fantasy land. It is mostly hard to point out the exact locations in most of the stories. The time period is also quite different for each story. The book is such a roller coaster, you feel you are in the 21st century and then you are tossed to ancient times in the next story, and then you are in the future.

Cursed Bunny has amazing characters. They are mostly flat, you know them from the first line. They are predictable, and yet so powerful in leaving an impact. I think it is the intense sadness and melancholy that surrounds almost every character that makes the reader love them all. I loved the character of the sorcerer in Ruler of the Wind and Sands and the narrator in Reunion.

Cursed Bunny deals with as many themes as you can think of, it deals with all the themes of human society. Bora Chung does an amazing job of exposing human nature. There is greed, lust, love, power, magic, revenge, helplessness, everything. The book is the perfect example of horror without ghosts. There are surely ghosts in some of the stories but overall, it is the creepy setting and plot of the story that frightens the reader. Above all, there is a very strong theme of curse in every story. It seems as if human life is a curse in itself, no matter who you are, where you live, what happens to you, and why. There is only one constant factor, every single character is CURSED!

Every story in Cursed Bunny has a different point of view. The reader basically experiences 1st and 3rd person POVs in the book so it is quite ideal for everyone.

The important thing about the book is its narrative. Bora Chung is an expert in narrating the simplest stories in the creepiest manner. She is very compelling. I felt like the author was sitting by my side telling me every story, word by word.

The stories are super short which makes them ideal to read in a single sitting. Also, the narrative is creepy yet realistic which was my favorite thing about the book. It is not all horror and weird, there are things that are highly relatable as well. Some of my favorite quotes that will give you an idea about the narrative style in Cursed Bunny are written below:

“ ‘Cursing others leads to two graves.’ Anyone who curses another person is sure to end up in a grave themselves.” (p. 66)

“But the more she tries to recall these memories the fainter they become, and like the last rays of the setting sun, they disappear leaving just a trace of their warmth behind.” (p. 76)

“In his dreams, the child sat under a tree with a white rabbit with black-tipped ears and tail, pleasantly eating away at his own brain.” (p. 61)

“I had no more hope for good times, but I didn’t want to wish for bad times, either. I was waiting for something but didn’t know what to hope for. There was no future.” (p. 246)

I love books that have a beautiful narrative and make me think outside the box. Bora Chung’s Cursed Bunny makes you think about human society as well as human individuality. It presents the classic man vs. society conflict in a very unique manner by putting every individual amidst creepy settings and bizarre events.

I was seriously thinking about human identity after witnessing the fate of the woman in The Head. The Embodiment made me think about women’s place in a patriarchal society. Cursed Bunny made me think about the havoc man is capable of bringing upon himself and others. The Frozen Finger made me judge my own memory and terrified me to death. Snare made me think about human lust, greed, and everything evil in the world. Good bye, My Love made me think of man’s future in a world run by AI. Scars made me think about human endurance and determination. Home Sweet Home made me think about how desperate times can affect our mental health. Ruler of the Wind and Sands made me think about the deceptive nature of appearances. Reunion made me think about the weight of living a life that is painful to bear.

Every story thus offered a new perspective to me and that’s what I liked the most about Cursed Bunny.

I loved the book, I only found two of the stories to be a little bit boring. The book gives you an interesting perspective to understand the human condition better. I will surely recommend it to someone who is dealing with a reading slump. The quick and creepy reads get you out of your slumber. It is also good for someone looking to try different and new genres as it has stories from almost all the genres, wrapped with the right amount of grotesque and creepiness.

If you are interested in reading good books which I am sure you are! Here are my top 5 reads of 2024 that you must check out, I am sure you will find your best next read.

Reference

Chung, Bora. Cursed Bunny. Honford Star, 2021.