Refrigerator 007
Adult Kindness 029
Deep Black Hole 049
Just think about it 071
Midnight Bird 089
Vinyl House 111
Soon the night came again at 125
While the shoes are drying 145
167 people I know
Alice lived next door 185
All Silence 205

“Only those who have been in fire know fire.

That's what experience is."

A strange visitor to the office, a late-night phone call that breaks the silence…
Our bright red future, one we never dreamed of as children.

"The Future of Adults," a collection of 11 short stories, lacks three things that often accompany stories that create tension and fear.
The first is blood.
The characters in "The Future of Adults" escape the sticky, damp world of blood and live ordinary, quiet lives.
They leave the house for work like any other day, and after work, they have a drink to relieve their fatigue.
The days, which seem monotonous at first glance because nothing happens, begin to crumble due to a very small incident.
Just as it turns out that the solid ground was actually empty, it also reveals that the daily lives of the characters were barely supported by a single rope.
Pyeon Hye-young's suspense revolves around that very empty space, that one line.


In “Adult’s Kindness,” Gi-myeong, who is “well-established as middle class in appearance, attitude, taste, and experience” (pp. 34-35), is suddenly followed by a man who appears and follows her persistently, causing her to look back with anxiety about whether she has ever done anything to deserve a grudge against someone. In “The Night Comes Again,” Jang I-su is unable to prevent the past mistakes he had managed to ignore from coming flooding back to him in an instant because of a woman who suddenly calls him in the middle of the night and threatens him, saying, “You’ll have to figure out who I am” (p. 131).


The second is screaming.
In the face of life's unexpected surprises, Pyeon Hye-young's characters do not scream loudly.
The same goes for 'I' in the novel 'Deep Black Hole', which is the most terrifying novel in this book.
While running a shoe shop, I happen to also buy gold teeth. I was discouraged by the poor sales when I received a visit from a man.
The man hands over a small, folded handkerchief, asking if she sells such things, containing several gold teeth.
Of course, it is like a windfall for me.
However, the novel shows how 'I' lose that luck again, as if to prove that "the scales of life do not always tilt towards luck" (p. 64).
What's impressive is that, as the novel saturates itself with tension and a sense of crisis and rushes toward its conclusion, not a single outburst of outrageous screams escapes the reader.
Just like the man who approached me with a polite and respectful appearance and handed me a handkerchief.


No one would have pictured a scene like the one above as a future we hoped for when we were young.
As if the passage of time means we are gradually moving further away from the image we dreamed of, the characters in “The Future of Adults” hide in the bathroom as if running away because they cannot bear to sit down at their office desks due to poor performance at work (“Midnight Bird”), and they leave for the countryside to seek a new life because “life is as difficult as that of dogs” (p. 114), but they end up in danger of getting stuck in a quagmire that is even more difficult to escape (“Vinyl House”).
Our ordinary lives of eating, working, and loving can be turned upside down at any time.
While reading 『The Future of Adults』, our breathing becomes rapid and we suddenly feel a sense of emptiness. This is partly because the author creates tension without spilling a single drop of blood through her characteristically concise prose, but it is also because the suspense in Pyeon Hye-young's novels arises in connection with the fragility of life.


A brief moment of jokes and laughter, followed by long-lasting secrets and sorrow.
Embracing the mysterious and incomprehensible life
11 Short Stories About How

On the one hand, that concern for fragile lives creates some exceptional moments in this book.
The third and final one, which is not in 『The Future of Adults』, is an irrecoverable tragedy.
This also means that Pyeon Hye-young's novels are branching out in a different direction than what we have been accustomed to.
In particular, “While Shoes Are Drying” and “Someone I Know,” which are placed in the latter half, clearly show this point.
In "While Your Shoes Are Drying," a twenty-year-old freshman in the workforce is left alone in the office on a rainy day when his superiors are not at work. He suddenly encounters a salesman promoting a collection of world literature. The sight of the freshman, with his shoulders soaked in rainwater and his worn-out shoes trampled in the snow, unable to easily shoo him away breathes unexpected warmth into Pyeon Hye-young's novel.
The relationship between a freshman and a salesman, which is revealed in a twist at the end, is touching and reminds us that our lives are not made up of only misfortune.

"Someone I Know," the story of Seung-ju, who had to move frequently because of her parents and was unable to make friends, also offers a gift-like moment to Seung-ju, who has lived in anxiety and loneliness for a long time.
Life has forced Seung-ju to be swept up in her parents' circumstances against her will, but life's uncontrollable nature also creates encounters she never anticipated.


As we open the first chapter of the book, we meet Mujin, a middle school student who cries quietly alone at home, in contrast to the people who enjoy the baseball game with cheers.
Mujin barely manages to swallow his tears and contacts his friend Ilwoo, telling him that his grandfather has passed away and asking for help.
While trying to figure out what Mujin had asked for, Ilwoo arrives home, and then an uninvited guest appears.
Choi Do-young, the coach of Mujin and Ilwoo, who are active in the baseball club, made an unexpected visit to their house.
He asks Mujin where his grandfather has gone and has no intention of leaving the house easily.
The suffocating silence between Choi Do-young, who is doggedly pursuing his grandfather's whereabouts, and Mu-jin and Il-woo, who are holding a secret he must not discover, is broken by the sound of an old, worn-out refrigerator.
Choi Do-young asks if the refrigerator is always this noisy and approaches it as if making a surprise attack.


An unexpected incident, an uninvited guest, and two boys too young to know life.
All the conditions for suspense are met.
I wonder what's in the refrigerator.
Now, let's open the door and check what Pyeon Hye-young has hidden.
This novel collection is full of things that cannot be guessed from sound and size alone, and that can only be discovered by opening the door.