Spoiler-Free Review

If you’re looking for a story that blends the movie Heathers with aspects of The Secret History into a dark and suspenseful tale wrought in pastel pink, you’ll like Bunny.

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What’s Bunny about?

Writer Samantha finds herself drawn into the strange and uncanny world of the Bunnies, the cultish clique in her graduate writing program.

This book was wild.

Right off the bat, I was struck by the distinctive narrative voice and imagery. As the main character, Samantha, is describing the clique of twee rich women who call each other “Bunny,” I could just imagine a montage of their off-putting saccharine behavior.

You could feel Samantha’s outsiderness, and how she both disdained the Bunnies but also secretly desired their approval and acceptance.

This story struck me as an analysis of the “femcel” – not just in the main character, but in the “Bunnies” as well. If you’re not familiar with the term, it’s a feminized version of “incel” (meaning, “involuntarily celibate”). For men, the term “incel” is usually used to describe those whose lack of sexual success has manifested into extreme aggression toward women. “Femcel” sexual frustration, on the other hand, seems to be aimed inward, and geared not just toward a lack of sexual outlets but toward feeling unlovable, as well. Both groups can be at risk for radicalization, and many of these online communities get banned for hate speech.

So back to this book’s portrayal of the femcel, specifically. I felt Bunny seeks to answer the question of how this particular brand of aggression might manifest in women who otherwise appear to be very successful. Women who are educated, wealthy, and high-achieving. But of course, set on a background of mild gore and and dark magic to enunciate what makes this scary.

I also got the sense that this story is saying something about the creative process. It seems to draw parallels between writing and performing disturbing occult rituals, while at the same time infusing the story with a sexual undertone. The horniness of it all combined with ritualistic wish fulfillment might even be a statement about lonely women using writing or fictional characters to fulfill romantic needs. It also points out the one dimensionality of creative works written by rich people with no perception of actual hardship, and how they “cosplay as poor” to appear deep or edgy.

Besides that, it had all the hallmarks of this particular blend of horror and dark academia. Cliques, inappropriate relationships with faculty (albeit not sexual, but inappropriate all the same), cultish occult behavior, and obsession. It also presented an interesting juxtaposition between a violent, impoverished town and an insular rich campus.

The further along I read, the more and more uncanny it got. After a point, things were so strange and nightmarish, I started questioning it. I knew the ending would either make or break this story for me. If I hated the ending, I would’ve hated the whole book for putting me through all that for nothing. But if I loved it, it would bring it all together beautifully. So I waited to see which it would be. And good news: it didn’t disappoint.

Should you read Bunny?

This is the kind of book you’ll either love or hate. It has a writing style that can feel like overwrought dribble in one moment, and then very basic the next moment. In my opinion, this matched our unreliable narrator perfectly, especially as she phased between sobriety and drugged-out bliss. But I can also see how this could be frustrating to read if you’re not into it.

I recommend this to fans of academic horror, dark academia, or stories that subversively pair “girly” things (like pink, frills, dresses, lace, hearts, etc.) with blood and magic. If you like the weird, uncanny, or demonic, or if you like characters with a God complex and dark magic abilities, then this is for you.

On the dark academia thread: I will say, I couldn’t make myself finish The Secret History even though it’s the exemplar of the genre, because I was so bored. But I really liked this one.