A review by murrderdith
The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty

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

3.0

This was an interesting, if not fully fleshed, novel. Told over a week from multiple perspectives, it focuses on the residents of an affordable housing complex in a rundown factory town in Indiana. The novel largely rotates around a teenage girl named Blandine who is obsessed with the medieval saint, Hildegard von Bingen, and creates unnerving art protests to undermine local redevelopment--you know, teen girl stuff. 

I genuinely did like the novel. The writing is fantastic and the characters are odd but also believable. That said, the multitude of intersecting narratives didn't always feel cohesive. I don't think the novel would have benefitted from stripping it down to a single third-person perspective but there are characters that could have been eliminated entirely (Hope and her husband) to give others (Joan) more space without taking anything from the larger plot.

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