A review by jkmartin38
The Cabinet by Un-su Kim

3.0

Interconnected stories about people who experience various unique symptoms and their bizarre lives. Each person has a file stored in cabinet at a research institute. The files are secretly read by the building’s security guard, who gets caught up in a larger story involving the files and the head research scientist. This was an light and quick read. Translation was smooth, albeit the book had many spelling errors. Some sections were interesting, like the symptomers who deleted their memories. I liked when the book used their symptoms as a mechanism to explore society, alienation, and loneliness. Although the tone never takes these issues seriously. Overall the book’s experimental narrative offered enough to keep me reading but never really reached full potential in the end. I may read his other translated book, which seems more promising.