- Overview
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Park Young’s novel delicately deals with the light and darkness that co-exists in a large city, like a loan shark and a hit man—someone who must kill to survive and someone who must survive to take revenge.
- Book Intro
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(English) Nameless People
The city of Hana is hit by recession. Companies go bankrupt one after another, and insolvent debtors abound. "I" am no exception. In order to pay off my father’s debt, I’m forced to work for "Jae" as a hit man. His targets are those who have failed to pay back loans secured on their life insurance policies. Every time I deal with a target, "I" get a new name. One day, Jae proposes a faster way for me to pay off the debt. All I have to do is dispose of the body of each target in a suitcase. With each target eliminated, my debt becomes smaller. The day before I’m due to carry out my last job and regain freedom, a problem arises. The target kills himself after reporting his own death. Just as I'm about to walk out with the dead body in a suitcase, I hear the police barging in and quickly hide. Thankfully, I go unnoticed. Yet, because of the suitcase containing the dead body of a man believed to have committed suicide, the detectives close in on me.
Jae tells me to stay out of town for the time being. I’m to go to District B and take care of things. District B is a disaster zone that was closed down after chemical factories had gone up in smoke a few years before. As I get ready to depart for District B, a woman named Seo Yuri appears. She asks scathingly if I still believe that I’ll be free once I’ve paid off my debt. Confused, I become suspicious of everyone. Yet, in order to survive, I must make it to District B. A place with no police or soldiers, isolated and abandoned by the world, it seems to have been deliberately erased. What is the truth behind District B? Will “I” be able to handle the target designated by Jae and return safely to the city of Hana?
(Japanese) 名もなき人々
不況に見舞われたハナ市。企業は次々と倒産し、個人破産者が殺到した。この街で人生の崖っぷちに立たされた人々に生命保険証を担保にお金を貸している「ジェ」、そして父の借金を返済するために灰の用役になった「私」。借金をすべて返し、自由を取り戻すための最後のターゲットを処理する日、予期せぬ問題が発生し、「私」に閉鎖された災害区域であるB区域で仕事をするよう命令する。 その時、「私」の前に、「私」に向けて復讐の刃を研ぐソ・ユリが現れ、混乱に陥った「私」は皆を疑うようになる。世界から隔離され、捨てられた土地「B地区」の真実は何なのか? 果たして「私」は無事にハナ市に戻ることができるのか?
- About the Author
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Park Young
(English) Park Young was born in 1983 in Seoul, Korea. After studying creative writing at Korea University, she made her literary debut in 2015 when her short story “Hello, Mister” won the Kyung-in Ilbo Spring Literary Contest. In 2017, she won the 3rd Hwangsanbeol Youth Literary Award with her novel Book of Consolation. She is the author of Book of Consolation, Restless Breaths, and The Nameless.
(Japanese) 2015年、京仁日報新春文芸に短編小説『おじさん、こんにちは』が当選しデビュー。2017年に最初の長編小説『慰安の書』で第3回黄山伐(ファンサンボル)青年文学賞を受賞し、2018年に2作目の長編小説『不穏な息』を出版した。