My final dark academia read for May and… I still don’t know what I just read.
Bunny by Mona Awad was a fever dream in every sense. It’s part satire, part horror, part MFA cult fantasy nightmare; it’s unstable, so feminine and pink, and completely feral. It made me laugh, cringe, spiral, and ask myself: am I okay? Is Mona Award okay?
I was asked what this book was about, and I totally blanked. I fumbled through my thoughts, then finally sputtered out the only answer I could manage: I don’t even know.
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The book follows Samantha, a scholarship student in an elite grad writing program, who gets pulled into the ultra-exclusive and ultra-strange clique of girls who call each other “Bunny.”
Things get weird.
Then they get really weird. Think: glitter, blood, loneliness, and unhinged creativity sessions that may or may not involve bunny boys. Yes, bunny boys. Like, a hybrid situation. Please don’t ask me any more about that.
I spent the first half wondering how this could be explained. Turning boys into bunnies?
Then I spent the rest trying to figure out if it was all in Samantha’s head, and finally just surrendering to the madness. By the end, I was metaphorically in the mud with her, asking aloud: what just happened.
I can’t tell you what’s real, what’s a metaphor, or what Mona Awad was thinking when she wrote this. But I can tell you this: it was a fun ride… and I will never be the same.
*edit: A sequal is coming… Here we go again, Bunny…
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