From Powells.com
Hot new releases and under-the-radar gems for adults and kids.
Synopses & Reviews
The new story collection from the author and translator of Cursed Bunny, a finalist for the 2023 National Book Award in Translated Literature
Your Utopia is full of tales of loss and discovery, idealism and dystopia, death and immortality. "Nothing concentrates the mind like Chung's terrors, which will shrivel you to a bouillon cube of your most primal instincts" (Vulture), yet these stories are suffused with Chung's inimitable wry humor and surprisingly tender moments, too.
In "The Center for Immortality Research," a low-level employee runs herself ragged planning a fancy gala for donors, only to be blamed for a crime she witnessed during the event, under the noses of the mysterious celebrity benefactors hoping to live forever. But she can't be fired--no one can. In "One More Kiss, Dear," a tender, one-sided love blooms in the AI-elevator of an apartment complex; as in, the elevator develops a profound affection for one of the residents. In "Seeds," we see the final frontier of capitalism's destruction of the planet and the GMO companies who rule the agricultural industry, but nature has ways of creeping back to life.
Chung's writing is "haunting, funny, gross, terrifying--and yet when we reach the end, we just want more" (Alexander Chee). If you haven't yet experienced the fruits of this singular imagination, Your Utopia is waiting.
Review
"Bora Chung's stories glisten at the border of our weird world, and all our other weird worlds. A truly sublime book." — Samantha Hunt, bestselling author of The Seas and The Unwritten Book
Review
"Unexpected, funny, thrillingly original. These stories will stick with me." — Ainslie Hogarth, author of the New York Times Best Book of the Year, Motherthing, and Normal Women
About the Author
Bora Chung has written three novels and three collections of short stories and translated modern literary works from Russian and Polish into Korean. After living in the US and studying at Yale University and Indiana University, she moved back to her home country of South Korea, where she translates and writes fiction.