Your Utopia: Stories

From the acclaimed author & translator of Cursed Bunny, a fresh, uncanny, & utterly profound collection of stories set in near & distant futures that reflect our deepest fears—and deepest desires. Bora Chung’s inimitable blend of horror, absurdity, & dark humor reaches its peak in these tales of loss & discovery, dystopia & idealism, death & immortality. In a thrilling translation by the acclaimed Anton Hur, readers will experience a variety of possible fates for humanity, from total demise via a disease whose only symptom is casual cannibalism to a world in which even dreams can be monitored & used to convict people of crimes. In “The Center for Immortality Research,” a low-level employee runs herself ragged planning a fancy gala for donors only to be blamed for the chaos that ensues during the event in front of the mysterious celebrity benefactors hoping to live forever. In “A Song for Sleep,” an AI elevator in an apartment complex develops a tender, one-sided love for an elderly resident. “Seed” traverses the final frontier of capitalism’s destruction of the planet—but nature always creeps back to life. If you haven’t yet experienced the fruits of Chung’s singular imagination, Your Utopia is waiting.°°° Bora Chung is a writer of science fiction & generally unrealistic stories. Bora also translates modern literary works from Russian & Polish into Korean. She has published 3 full-length novels & 4 books of collected short stories in Korean. She likes dark & magical stories & stories about strong women who fight to survive in an unjust & violent world. Anton Hur was born in Stockholm, Sweden, & was subsequently raised in British Hong Kong, Ethiopia, the United States, & Thailand, but spent most of his time in Korea. His translation of Bora Chung’s Cursed Bunny was a finalist for the International Booker Prize & the National Book Award for Translated Literature. From the acclaimed author and translator of the National Book Award Finalist, Cursed Bunny, a fresh, uncanny, and utterly profound collection of stories set in near and distant futures that reflect our deepest fears — and deepest desires. Bora Chung’s inimitable blend of horror, absurdity, and dark humor reaches its peak in these tales of loss and discovery, dystopia and idealism, death and immortality. In a thrilling translation by the acclaimed Anton Hur, readers will experience a variety of possible fates for humanity, from total demise via a disease whose only symptom is casual cannibalism to a world in which even dreams can be monitored and used to convict people of crimes. In “The Center for Immortality Research,” a low-level employee runs herself ragged planning a fancy gala for donors only to be blamed for the chaos that ensues during the event in front of the mysterious celebrity benefactors hoping to live forever. In “A Song for Sleep,” an AI elevator in an apartment complex develops a tender, one-sided love for an elderly resident. “Seed” traverses the final frontier of capitalism’s destruction of the planet — but nature always creeps back to life. If you haven’t yet experienced the fruits of Chung’s singular imagination, Your Utopia is waiting. By the internationally acclaimed author of Cursed Bunny , in another thrilling translation from the Korean by Anton Hur, Your Utopia is full of tales of loss and discovery, idealism and dystopia, death and immortality. These stories are suffused with Chung's inimitable wry humour and surprisingly tender moments, too often between unexpected subjects. 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 cant 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 capitalisms destruction of the planet and the GMO companies who rule the agricultural industry in this bleak future, but nature has ways of creeping back to life. If you havent yet experienced the fruits of this singular imagination, Your Utopia is waiting.