Reviews with content warning for Schizophrenia/Psychosis - Rouge

I loved the idea of this book, and the prologue immediately drew me in. Belle was such a compelling character at the start — the fact that she was obsessive and single minded interestingly gave her character a lot of depth. However, about a third of the way through, I started to lose interested and contemplated DNFing this. What kept me reading was a spoiler (

Egyptian mythology

) which in reality wasn’t there. It became extremely repetitive and boring; They could have cut out the 5-7 hours in the middle and it wouldn’t have mattered much. I ended up putting this on 2x just so I could get through it.

I liked the wordplay in the latter chapters (

eucalyptus / apocalypse, vanity / insanity, serve / sever

); The writing was otherwise fine, if at times repetitive. The pacing was also very weird. The start was fine, the middle was slow and drawn out, and the ending felt rushed.

Besides Belle in the first third, I didn’t like any of the characters nor was I invested in any of them — except, maybe oddly, her dad.

I wish we found out more about him or explored Belle’s Egyptian heritage more. Also, if you’re going to hint at Egyptian mythology, do *something* with it.

Otherwise, the characters were quite flat. This was probably deliberate for everyone associated with the spa, but it would have been more impactful if the book was shorter. I’m not sure the narration helped; I found some of the accents quite grating.

While I apprciate the message this is trying to convey, I really, really wish the rampant racism/colourism which Belle has also internalised was confronted head on. Instead, all we get is a sense at the end that

Belle is starting to move on

. This is what the book should have spent more time on, rather than the aforementioned repetitive middle section. I get that not every book has to explicitly say racism is bad, etc., but there was so much happening that I don’t think this point was adequately conveyed as is.

Overall, I feel like the book focused too much on being an absurd horror story at the detriment of being a biting critique of the beauty industry.

Content Warnings

avokaitotoast's review

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challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Another hit from Mona.

I was worried after reading and loving Bunny that this would disappoint or be too similar and feel like a reach to hold on to the hit that Bunny was. Thank god it wasn’t.

One thing I‘ll say — Mona Awad writes horror in an atypical way, so don’t expect crazy gore or shock horror or crazy suspense. She has a very elegant way of making beautiful things grotesque and absurd.

Another thing — this is marketed as a fairy tale re-telling. Don’t go into this book looking for that. There are elements of fairy tales but it’s so subtle (which imo is the best way to do a re-telling).

Go into this book thinking about mother-daughter relationships and how grief can drastically warp your sense of self and change how you think and feel about the people you thought you knew.

It did take me a while to get into the book (Awads writing style is veryyyyy slow burn), but once I was a few chapters in I couldn’t put it down.

Can’t wait to read her other books, and I’ll look forward to whatever she writes next!

Content Warnings Explained
Trafficking:

Plot involves people joining an exclusive skin care cult, some members seek it out themselves and some are recruited. Members are essentially brainwashed and it’s revealed that they are meant to be pseudo-cannibalised (if you read it you’ll get it) by the cult leaders

Psychosis:

Main character has massive memory gaps but slowly remembers through out the novel. She hallucinates heavily and is violent because of these hallucinations.

Content Warnings

danimacuk's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Content Warnings

hannahalane's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious sad slow-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

phantompansy's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

Content Warnings

sarasreading's review

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challenging dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I love how Mona Awad crafts such complex themes and narratives, weaving many ideas and nuance into an ABSOLUTELY unhinged wild ride of a book. I devoured this (pun intended).

Content Warnings

catriona176's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.25

Another chaotic fever dream of a book from Mona Awad. I think I liked this more than Bunny but a lot of it I didn’t completely “get”, though I feel like someone more skilled with literary analysis could have hours of enjoyment here.

Content Warnings

nosleepbee's review

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dark emotional mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

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