If you’re looking for stories that keep you on your toes, that make you question everything you read and wonder whether you grasp the ‘real’ story, then read Bluebeard’s First Wife by Korean author Ha Seong-nan.
Bluebeard's First Wife synopsis
Disasters, accidents, and deaths abound in Bluebeard’s First Wife. A woman spends a night with her fiancé and his friends, and overhears a terrible secret that has bound them together since high school. A man grows increasingly agitated by the apartment noise made by a young family living upstairs and arouses the suspicion of his own wife when the neighbors meet a string of unlucky incidents. A couple moves into a picture-perfect country house, but when their new dog is stolen, they become obsessed with finding the thief, and in the process, neglect their child. Ha’s paranoia-inducing, heart-quickening stories will have you reconsidering your own neighbors.
Book review
With short stories, you never know what the stories will be about before you start reading. But having read another short story collection by Ha Seong-nan, Flowers of Mold, I started reading with some expectations.
The first story in this collection, The Star-Shaped Stain, immediately sets the tone: sorrowful with modest hope. It’s impressive how you can get a sense of foreboding from the very first page of a story, but Ha Seong-nan manages it with nearly every story in Bluebeard’s First Wife. That shows good writing skills.
The stories in this collection are less indirect and spiritual and more mundane than those in Flowers of Mold. So you can imagine my surprise when I started Flies. I will forever believe there is more to this story, that there is this different story beneath the surface, just beyond my grasp. I would have loved to know more about the background of the police officer so that I could understand his reaction to the situation better. Whereas Flies kickstarted my imagination, Night Poaching, a story with a similar setting, turned out to be less interesting.
Most of the stories are about not knowing someone you live with and, as a result, growing apart. The main characters find out about a missing piece of information halfway or at the end of the story. That’s what all the stories have in common: the main characters, often the wives, learn something new that changes the way they see things, but seeing no solution, they just go with the flow. The reader can see a solution though, but that is usually when the stories end. You don’t really know what happens after, which is fine: you’re reading a snapshot of someone’s life.
You follow the daily struggles of ordinary people who find themselves in situations they don’t want to be in, hoping it isn’t true. Suspicions are everywhere. And in retrospect, the main characters realize things. And right when I thought no one was ever gonna act on anything, A Quiet Night happened. Together with Pinky Finger, it provided the much-needed action, or rather, activity. These two and Flies were my favorite stories in Bluebeard’s First Wife.
After reading two short story collections by Ha Seong-nan, I can without a doubt say that she writes very good stories. If you’re looking for stories that keep you on your toes, that make you question everything you read and wonder whether you grasp the ‘real’ story, then read Bluebeard’s First Wife or Flowers of Mold.
Translated from Korean by Janet Hong.
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