Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

Bunny by Mona Awad

95 reviews

rosesofthespring's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

If you're looking for a Lovecraft-inspired novel about the cosmic horror of toxic female friendships, I'm happy to tell you that your extremely specific search is at an end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Cursing, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Animal death, Blood, Classism, Death, Grief, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Violence, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Car accident, Gaslighting, Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Self harm, Sexual content, and Vomit

Minor: Eating disorder, Excrement, Gun violence, Rape, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Suicide

gwrhyr's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

Every single character sucks in a 2D, plucked-from-Tumbr sort of way. The main character is so insufferable that the first hundred pages of the book are almost impossible to get through. Samantha spends half of the book feeling sorry for herself and seems to base her entire personality on internalised misogyny, embodying the trope of 'not like other girls'. Although all of the characters are 'quirky', none of them are memorable, so that 150 pages in you still have to go back to remember who Victoria was.

Bunny invokes a sense of performative ‘wokeness’ in that it seems to comment on the elitist settings of Ivy league colleges, yet the author makes use of slurs. On top of that, the novel, especially its writing style, is needlessly vulgar and misogynistic, and seems to be written largely for shock-value.

At least the third part was somewhat interesting, but even with suspension of disbelief some events were simply illogical and did not seem to line up with the narrative. Other parts were so confusingly written that it became hard to understand what was going on. The ending was a desperate attempt at a plottwist. All in all, Bunny reads like bad fanfiction. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Misogyny, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, and Violence

ashleyerne's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Blood, Death of parent, Drug use, Gore, Mental illness, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Suicidal thoughts

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

It was a vibe.

To put it simply, it's not my cup of tea but I understand it being someone else's.  Well written, probably improves on re-reading.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Gaslighting, Murder, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Abandonment, Alcohol, Blood, Car accident, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Dysphoria, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

sydoodle's review against another edition

challenging dark funny mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, and Violence

Moderate: Gaslighting

Minor: Addiction, Bullying, Car accident, Drug use, Rape, and Racial slurs

purplelake's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Drug use, Mental illness, Animal death, Cursing, Gore, Murder, Sexual content, Toxic friendship, Violence, and Blood

Moderate: Kidnapping, Self harm, Slavery, Gaslighting, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Death of parent, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Addiction, Bullying, and Classism

Minor: Car accident, Eating disorder, Confinement, Vomit, Grief, and Rape

genny's review against another edition

challenging dark funny mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I debated on my rating for this, but as I thought back on it and looked at it from different angles, I couldn't deny that this merits 5 stars from me. I went into this expecting something odd in the way that literary fiction often can be - the lines between reality and fantasy blurred, cryptic messages about ~*life*~, depressed (or depressing) characters...and we did get all that, but I didn't expect this to be a satire of sorts. It's so FUNNY! I felt a very Samantha-like horrified laugh bubble up in my throat multiple times. Once I realized that this was akin to campy horror like Jennifer's Body, that's when the book and I really "got along".  It wasn't there to mock me with its absurdity, as if I wasn't intelligent enough to Understand Literature; instead it was there to poke fun at the very idea. Even the ending was funny to me,

like the finale of a horror comedy movie where it's finally daybreak and the characters have to awkwardly stand there, eyeing each other and surveying all the damage in the light of the sun.

There's fantastic commentary underneath the absurdity that is easy to digest: Samantha's extreme insecurity, her hatred for convention while she craves it at the same time, the unattainability of perfect female friendship (her idea of it, at least), etcera etcetera. I might be in the minority who didn't guess the twist about

Ava

, and now I want to reread the book with this in mind. Bunny is definitely an acquired taste. I'm pleasantly surprised that I ended up loving it so much. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Death, Drug use, Gore, Mental illness, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Violence

Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Sexual content

thereaderfriend's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Loved this. Very heavy influences from Heather's, The Craft, Jennifer's Body, Alice in Wonderland, Frankenstein,  Mean Girls, and so much more. Creepy, ambiguous read. Very open ended. Something I think you've gotta reread bc somethings I think were hidden underneath and meant to be analyzed and revealed later. Look into the trigger warnings before reading!! Also wanted to say I loved the writing styles! Felt like I was in the book because of the atmospheric writing. Definitely felt the senses and the watching eyes that seemed to always be there even if they weren't always obvious. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Gore

Moderate: Blood, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Confinement, Drug use, Vomit, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Alcohol, Death of parent, and Torture

ekmook's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Death, Drug abuse, Gore, Grief, Self harm, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, Classism, Drug use, Toxic friendship, Violence, Blood, and Body horror

Minor: Alcoholism, Death of parent, Fatphobia, and Mental illness

tkatt20's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This was not what I had hoped it was going to be. I was under the impression that this book was a horror/thriller about a cult that was really dark and twisted and had a big plot twist. Maybe if you're not looking too closely then this could be considered that, but not by much. There is a small and pretty predictable plot twist, that you only understand if you're actually paying attention to every detail, but otherwise I didn't find this very thrilling. Now that is totally on me for not understanding what I was getting into, but even if I had been under the right impression, I dont think I would have liked this at all. I'd say I was semi interested for the first 40% but after that it was just utter confusion. The entire book completely flips in content and pacing without much warning or explanation, so the entire time i was trying to connect things that didn't make sense together. I love a good unreliable narrator just like the next person, but once I'm spending more time trying to decipher whats real and what isn't, then you've lost me. It became clear very early that our main character was struggling with some sort of mental illness, but even without her I really didn't care about a single character. The writing style was interesting but became so repetitive, I mean, you can only read the word "bunny" so many times before going insane. There is a good 1/3 of the book that doesn't seem to fit pacing and content wise, that probably could have been omitted without much consequence. I can kind of see what the author was going for here, but with so many unanswered questions I can see why it gets lost on so many who read this. This would be perfect for you if you are looking for something slow-paced and open-ended, but if you want the vibes of a classic thriller then I'd look elsewhere. All in all, I would say this is not what it's advertised as, it's more like a story about a very lonely girl struggling with normal people things.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Animal death, Toxic friendship, Blood, Death, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Rape, Mental illness, Bullying, and Classism

Minor: Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Car accident, Death of parent, Eating disorder, Abandonment, and Self harm