Seven uncanny stories translated in US, UK; winner to be announced Oct. 21

Jeong Bora's "Midnight Timetable." [Galmaenamu]
Jeong Bora's "Midnight Timetable." [Galmaenamu]

Korean author Jeong Bora's short story collection "Midnight Timetable" has been shortlisted for the 2026 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction.

Established in 2022, the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction is awarded annually to a single work of imaginative fiction. Anyone — readers, writers, booksellers, publishers and librarians alike — may nominate a work, and a jury of authors selects the winner each year.

"Midnight Timetable" collects seven uncanny stories centered on night-shift workers at a mysterious institute that stores and manages unidentified objects, and the strange events surrounding those objects. The book showcases Jeong's characteristic moral clarity on good and evil through themes of curses and revenge, while extending a warm gaze toward the vulnerable, the marginalized and the nonhuman — weaving what might be called a fiction of peculiar care.

The collection drew wide acclaim at home and abroad. Published in Korea in 2023, it appeared in English translation in the United States and the United Kingdom in 2025, with rights sold to France, Vietnam, Turkey, Germany, the Netherlands, Ukraine, Indonesia and China.

The translation was handled by Anton Hur, who previously translated Jeong's "Cursed Bunny" — shortlisted for the 2022 International Booker Prize — and Park Sang-young's novel "Love in the Big City."

The winner will be announced Oct. 21.


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