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booksaurus98's reviews
5 reviews
Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung
I really struggle with short story collections.
I enjoy the feeling of getting lost in a novel and spending a good few hours getting to know the situation, surrounding and characters. I feel most short stories just can't deliver that. It seems to me inevitable that the stories in any given collection will vary in quality - I read a great story and then the following one is an absolute dud which makes me want to give up on the collection ( Im looking at you 'Her Body and Other Parties'). So its a pleasant and welcome surprise when a short story collection is one of my favourite reads of the year so far.
Cursed Bunny is a collection of short stories in which the author varies genre - there's gross out body horror, ghost stories, sci-fi, fairytale, mythology. I would say the entire collection is incredibly dark and if I was forced to file it under one specific genre I would choose horror. Below is a short summary of each of the stories found in this collection:
The Head - one day a disgusting misshapen lump pops out of a woman's toilet. The lump claims to be the daughter of the child, but a daughter formed from the woman's bathroom waste. It's a disgusting story about bodily waste and the beginning and ends of human life. After my initial reading I thought, 'well that was gross and offputting, but nothing more', until I went to use the bathroom in later in the day and found myself darting out afterwards to avoid my own 'lump' and found that the thought of having a shower was genuinely freaking me out.
The Embodiment - another bizarre story with gross out elements. A young woman becomes pregnant and must find a father in time for her baby's arrival into the world. While this wasn't one of my favourites, I thought it was a very smart story exploring the perils and pressures of single motherhood.
The Cursed Bunny - a little boy lays in bed listening to his grandfather recite a story he has heard many times. Then grandfather tells an old family tale of the destruction of one of the most powerful family's in the region, all thanks to a cursed fetish object created by the grandfather's family. One of my favourites - a classic horror story with heart.
The Frozen Finger - the aftermath of a horrific car crash. An eery and stunning short story.
Snare - Maybe my favourite in the collection. A classic tale of greed gone wrong; a riff off the old tale of King Midas.
Goodbye, My Love - Classic AI gone wrong. I felt this was one of the weaker stories of the collection, due to the plot being predictable and tropey. ( If you have read any AI story or watched anything with AI you know this story)
Scars - Folklore/mythology feels. A strange man appears in a village with a murky past and many scars. This was one of the saddest stories in the collection.
Home Sweet Home - A haunted house story with a twist. While I found the final twist confusing, it was also different which I respected.
Ruler of the Winds and Sand - Fairy tale like. Feels like something you'd read or have read to you as a child.
Reunion - The ghost story of the bunch. I thought it was effective - more sad than creepy, but I suppose that's the case for most ghost stories.
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
5.0
I really struggle with short story collections.
I enjoy the feeling of getting lost in a novel and spending a good few hours getting to know the situation, surrounding and characters. I feel most short stories just can't deliver that. It seems to me inevitable that the stories in any given collection will vary in quality - I read a great story and then the following one is an absolute dud which makes me want to give up on the collection ( Im looking at you 'Her Body and Other Parties'). So its a pleasant and welcome surprise when a short story collection is one of my favourite reads of the year so far.
Cursed Bunny is a collection of short stories in which the author varies genre - there's gross out body horror, ghost stories, sci-fi, fairytale, mythology. I would say the entire collection is incredibly dark and if I was forced to file it under one specific genre I would choose horror. Below is a short summary of each of the stories found in this collection:
The Head - one day a disgusting misshapen lump pops out of a woman's toilet. The lump claims to be the daughter of the child, but a daughter formed from the woman's bathroom waste. It's a disgusting story about bodily waste and the beginning and ends of human life. After my initial reading I thought, 'well that was gross and offputting, but nothing more', until I went to use the bathroom in later in the day and found myself darting out afterwards to avoid my own 'lump' and found that the thought of having a shower was genuinely freaking me out.
The Embodiment - another bizarre story with gross out elements. A young woman becomes pregnant and must find a father in time for her baby's arrival into the world. While this wasn't one of my favourites, I thought it was a very smart story exploring the perils and pressures of single motherhood.
The Cursed Bunny - a little boy lays in bed listening to his grandfather recite a story he has heard many times. Then grandfather tells an old family tale of the destruction of one of the most powerful family's in the region, all thanks to a cursed fetish object created by the grandfather's family. One of my favourites - a classic horror story with heart.
The Frozen Finger - the aftermath of a horrific car crash. An eery and stunning short story.
Snare - Maybe my favourite in the collection. A classic tale of greed gone wrong; a riff off the old tale of King Midas.
Goodbye, My Love - Classic AI gone wrong. I felt this was one of the weaker stories of the collection, due to the plot being predictable and tropey. ( If you have read any AI story or watched anything with AI you know this story)
Scars - Folklore/mythology feels. A strange man appears in a village with a murky past and many scars. This was one of the saddest stories in the collection.
Home Sweet Home - A haunted house story with a twist. While I found the final twist confusing, it was also different which I respected.
Ruler of the Winds and Sand - Fairy tale like. Feels like something you'd read or have read to you as a child.
Reunion - The ghost story of the bunch. I thought it was effective - more sad than creepy, but I suppose that's the case for most ghost stories.
The Cheater's Guide to Love by Junot Díaz
...love,real love, is not so easily shed'
The writing is electric.
A longterm relationship comes to a grinding hault after the narrators fiance find his collection of emails attesting to 6 years worth of constant cheating. Yunior moves back to Boston and leans on his best friend,Elvis, for support. The years come and go, but he can't seem to shake the failure of his relationship and can't seem to learn much from it either.
Yunior is smart, grimy, self-pitying and frequently misogynistic, but his voice is ultra compelling. One of the better Faber short stories I've read and has made me want to read more of the author's writing.
emotional
funny
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
...love,real love, is not so easily shed'
The writing is electric.
A longterm relationship comes to a grinding hault after the narrators fiance find his collection of emails attesting to 6 years worth of constant cheating. Yunior moves back to Boston and leans on his best friend,Elvis, for support. The years come and go, but he can't seem to shake the failure of his relationship and can't seem to learn much from it either.
Yunior is smart, grimy, self-pitying and frequently misogynistic, but his voice is ultra compelling. One of the better Faber short stories I've read and has made me want to read more of the author's writing.
Earthlings by Sayaka Murata
Children's lives never belong to them. The grown ups own us.
I think there has been times in most of our lives when we have looked at some aspect of the daily grind of life and just though,'why?'. I'm sure that there are cultural and societal norms that we feel don't benefit us, and indeed may not benefit anyone at all. The main character, Natsuki, has the ability from a young age to cast a detached eye on society and clearly see its absurdities - especially the absurdities of the lives of the adults in her life.
Eleven year old Natsuki knows that she has been burdened to protect the Earthlings. This is her mission, given to her by a plush hedgehog toy Piyyut from the planet of Popinpobopia. She has been endowed magical powers which she must use to protect herself and sometimes others from the evil forces at play in her strange world. A world where all the adults are obsessed with baby-making and working all day. The one good thing in her life is the summers she spends in her grandmother's mountain house with her cousin Yuu, who also has links to Popinpobopia. After a shocking incident occurs between the cousins, the summer is yanked away from her and she is left to survive as best she can amongst the earthlings. All grown up, Natsuki finds a kindred spirit in her asexual husband and the two propel eachother to try to finally shake off the earthlings keeping them hostage.
There is so much to talk about in this heartbreaking and bizarre little book. The effect of child abuse and neglect that follows people throughout their lives; the feeling of being isolated from society and the genuine bizarreness of earthlings.
This is a story that becomes weirder and weirder towards the end, but at every step I felt Murata knew what she was doing and that every twist and turn in the story was ultimately inevitable
challenging
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Children's lives never belong to them. The grown ups own us.
I think there has been times in most of our lives when we have looked at some aspect of the daily grind of life and just though,'why?'. I'm sure that there are cultural and societal norms that we feel don't benefit us, and indeed may not benefit anyone at all. The main character, Natsuki, has the ability from a young age to cast a detached eye on society and clearly see its absurdities - especially the absurdities of the lives of the adults in her life.
Eleven year old Natsuki knows that she has been burdened to protect the Earthlings. This is her mission, given to her by a plush hedgehog toy Piyyut from the planet of Popinpobopia. She has been endowed magical powers which she must use to protect herself and sometimes others from the evil forces at play in her strange world. A world where all the adults are obsessed with baby-making and working all day. The one good thing in her life is the summers she spends in her grandmother's mountain house with her cousin Yuu, who also has links to Popinpobopia. After a shocking incident occurs between the cousins, the summer is yanked away from her and she is left to survive as best she can amongst the earthlings. All grown up, Natsuki finds a kindred spirit in her asexual husband and the two propel eachother to try to finally shake off the earthlings keeping them hostage.
There is so much to talk about in this heartbreaking and bizarre little book. The effect of child abuse and neglect that follows people throughout their lives; the feeling of being isolated from society and the genuine bizarreness of earthlings.
This is a story that becomes weirder and weirder towards the end, but at every step I felt Murata knew what she was doing and that every twist and turn in the story was ultimately inevitable
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Incest, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt
Acts of Desperation by Megan Nolan
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I have a soft spot for the genre of writing I have dubbed ‘Hot Mess Millennial fiction’ - books written from the point of view of women, usually in there early twenties to early thirties; who are riddled with anxiety/low self esteem and depressive tendencies; who are often isolated from their families in some way ; who cope with these issues through a constant series of poor decisions and self destructive habits; who tend to underachieve in their professional live; and end up within dysfunctional and toxic relationships with friends,colleagues and romantic partners. There are a number of much lauded books that have been published recently which fit into this genre:
Luster by Raven Leilani
Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
Conversations with Friends - Sally Rooney
Normal People - Sally Rooney
Exciting Times - Naoise Dolan *
Promising Young Woman - Caroline O’ Donoghue
Insatiable - Daisy Buchanan *
Supper Club - Lara Williams
Pizza Girl - Jean Kyoung Frazier
Acts of Desperation - Megan Nolan
The authors, usually millennial women themselves, create these women characters who are, at first meeting, incredibly hard to love. Characters’ volley between hyper-awareness at the absurdity and patheticness of their lives and a complete lack of self awareness about the impact their decisions have on others. Basically, these aren’t the kind of women you want to pet sit your dog.
Moving on to why I love this ‘genre’ so much - I relate to the characters.
I don’t want to self-disclose too much, because this review isn’t about me and my own poor life choices ( it’s about the unnamed protagonist's poor life choices) , but I could definitely sympathise with a lot of the thought processes and reflections made by the protagonist. The bookmark I was using had the Ursula K. Le Guin quote on it, ‘We read books to find out who we are’ which was apt for ‘Acts of Desperation’. With every Hot Mess Millennial book I read I learn a little bit more about myself, about the parts of myself I don’t really like thinking about and acknowledging and for that I am very grateful.
In Nolan’s debut novel the young woman narrator reflects back on a relationship with an older man that ended a few years prior. Cieran is handsome and self - obsessed which frequently leads to him being cruel to her. The young woman can’t seem to leave him. She loves him. Her reliance on him being in her life leads to her little ‘acts of desperation’, cooking and cleaning and providing sex and always being agreeable. A modern woman voluntarily reduces herself to a stepford wife. Throughout the narration of the volatile relationship between these two characters, the narrator will interject with long reflections and reasoning as to why she is the way she is. We find out about her family, eating disorders, borderline addictions and previous relationships. In ‘Acts of Desperation’ Nolan creates a beautifully fleshed out character, who is so human with her vulnerabilities and limitations.
There are trigger warnings for graphic sexual abuse, self-harm, drug and alcohol use and eating disorders. This isn’t an easy read, but is a great insight into the life of an interesting character.
Luster by Raven Leilani
Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
Conversations with Friends - Sally Rooney
Normal People - Sally Rooney
Exciting Times - Naoise Dolan *
Promising Young Woman - Caroline O’ Donoghue
Insatiable - Daisy Buchanan *
Supper Club - Lara Williams
Pizza Girl - Jean Kyoung Frazier
Acts of Desperation - Megan Nolan
The authors, usually millennial women themselves, create these women characters who are, at first meeting, incredibly hard to love. Characters’ volley between hyper-awareness at the absurdity and patheticness of their lives and a complete lack of self awareness about the impact their decisions have on others. Basically, these aren’t the kind of women you want to pet sit your dog.
Moving on to why I love this ‘genre’ so much - I relate to the characters.
I don’t want to self-disclose too much, because this review isn’t about me and my own poor life choices ( it’s about the unnamed protagonist's poor life choices) , but I could definitely sympathise with a lot of the thought processes and reflections made by the protagonist. The bookmark I was using had the Ursula K. Le Guin quote on it, ‘We read books to find out who we are’ which was apt for ‘Acts of Desperation’. With every Hot Mess Millennial book I read I learn a little bit more about myself, about the parts of myself I don’t really like thinking about and acknowledging and for that I am very grateful.
In Nolan’s debut novel the young woman narrator reflects back on a relationship with an older man that ended a few years prior. Cieran is handsome and self - obsessed which frequently leads to him being cruel to her. The young woman can’t seem to leave him. She loves him. Her reliance on him being in her life leads to her little ‘acts of desperation’, cooking and cleaning and providing sex and always being agreeable. A modern woman voluntarily reduces herself to a stepford wife. Throughout the narration of the volatile relationship between these two characters, the narrator will interject with long reflections and reasoning as to why she is the way she is. We find out about her family, eating disorders, borderline addictions and previous relationships. In ‘Acts of Desperation’ Nolan creates a beautifully fleshed out character, who is so human with her vulnerabilities and limitations.
There are trigger warnings for graphic sexual abuse, self-harm, drug and alcohol use and eating disorders. This isn’t an easy read, but is a great insight into the life of an interesting character.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcohol, Eating disorder, Self harm, Sexual assault, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Alcoholism
Minor: Drug use
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