The Night Nobody Returns Home by Kim Soom

Another good read in these excellent bilingual series. Kim creates a certain atmosphere in this story, an atmosphere that lingers uncomfortably. 

Almost nothing happens in this story, plotwise; the protagonist's father-in-law goes on his evening walk, leaving his stand-in, the constantly cooking duck bone soup. The protagonist waits for her husband and her father-in-law to return home to eat dinner. They do not return at the expected time. She goes down to check to see whether her neighbour downstairs has returned home or not. This neighbour owes her father money, which her father says she can keep once collected.

Meanwhile the duck bone soup continues to simmer, its stubborn stench perforating the whole apartment complex, a stench that worsens the pregnant protagonist's morning sicknesses. 

The collection of critical essays and critiques really helped my understanding of the story (another thing that is so good about these series), especially the comments calling her oeuvre a writing of the "grotesque" verbalized the feeling I had while reading this story.

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