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A review by hyebitshines
City of Ash and Red by Pyun Hye-young
3.0
this was a strange book that I started reading in May, on my sister’s balcony in humid Houston, and couldn’t bring myself to finish until now … in this story that reflects if not depicts our pandemic reality on worse terms, between teeming rats and underground sewers,
we see the main character, elusively dubbed “the man,” as he descends into a life of vagrancy and questioning what his humanity means. oh, and he brutally killed his ex-wife before arriving in the foreign country to which he’s transferred.
yet the man’s murderous instincts are likened to some out-of-mind, blackout possession where his body vents out the layers of denial and self-justification he is buried in. while I admire the writing, the visceral descriptions, the poignant observations about people and what makes them human or inhuman, it was a difficult story to read, like I was trying to tamp down a real headache. and the man’s actions at the end all just seem senseless. which there’s nothing wrong with, but this wasn’t a story I was inclined to want to finish.
I should note that this story was published before COVID, in 2018, giving it some sense of eerily close foreshadowing. I definitely want to read more of this writer, at a different time.
we see the main character, elusively dubbed “the man,” as he descends into a life of vagrancy and questioning what his humanity means. oh, and he brutally killed his ex-wife before arriving in the foreign country to which he’s transferred.
yet the man’s murderous instincts are likened to some out-of-mind, blackout possession where his body vents out the layers of denial and self-justification he is buried in. while I admire the writing, the visceral descriptions, the poignant observations about people and what makes them human or inhuman, it was a difficult story to read, like I was trying to tamp down a real headache. and the man’s actions at the end all just seem senseless. which there’s nothing wrong with, but this wasn’t a story I was inclined to want to finish.
I should note that this story was published before COVID, in 2018, giving it some sense of eerily close foreshadowing. I definitely want to read more of this writer, at a different time.