Book Review: ‘We Love You, Bunny’ by Mona Awad
If you’ve stumbled onto this page and you haven’t read ‘Bunny’ first, then turn around now. You can read ‘We Love You, Bunny’ without reading its predecessor… but it will make even less sense. Trust.
Here’s the summary:
“When We Love You, Bunny opens, Sam has just published her first novel to critical acclaim. But at a New England stop on her book tour, her one-time frenemies, furious at the way they’ve been portrayed, kidnap her. Now a captive audience, it’s her (and our) turn to hear the Bunnies’ side of the story. One by one, they take turns holding the axe, and recount the birth throes of their unholy alliance, their discovery of their unusual creative powers — and the phantasmagoric adventure of conjuring their first creation. With a bound and gagged Sam, we embark on a wickedly intoxicating journey into the heart of dark academia: a fairy tale slasher that explores the wonder and horror of creation itself. Not to mention the transformative powers of love and friendship, Bunny.”
There is something about Awad’s writing that I find so alluring and yet, on my third attempt, it still feels like a… trying experience. I do love a strangely divisive read, and this second outing into the Bunnyverse is definitely that, if online reviews are anything to go by.
But you didn’t come here to read what other people thought about it, did you, Bunny? You wanted the real story—from my own mouth.
Well.
Let me start by saying this: this book will leave you gooped and gagged by the end. The end. THE ENDING. It’s something I can’t stop thinking about.
One of the most compelling elements here is the commentary on creation itself; on the creative process, authorship, and the unsettling relationship between creator and creation. Sam spends much of the novel positioned as a kind of silent witness, caught inside narratives that seem to move around and through her. She watches. She absorbs. She survives. And then, in those final moments, something… shifts. Something hoppy. And suddenly the power dynamic doesn’t feel quite so stable.
It’s clever. It’s unnerving. It’s deeply self-aware.
This is a long book though, and at times, it feels long. But I was so deeply intrigued by what Awad was doing structurally and thematically that I didn’t mind. Something we discussed on the podcast was how the existence of this sequel (prequel? companion? both?) arguably undermines some of the gravitas of ‘Bunny’. If that book was a closed system (strange, sharp, self-contained) then reopening the universe risks puncturing its myth.
But I actually think that dissatisfied feeling is part of the fun.
Hear me out.
As readers, we often feel entitled to clean closure. We want carefully constructed narrative arcs that resolve in smooth lines. ‘We Love You, Bunny’ tears up that script and reminds us that we are not owed a happy ending, or even a tidy one. I love that I’m left with more questions than answers, even if it leaves me a tiny bit frustrated too. The discomfort feels intentional. Almost mischievous.
The writing itself is rock solid. I initially tried the audiobook but struggled with the voices of the Bunnies, so switching to Kindle was the right call because I fell straight back into the rhythm of the prose. On the page, Awad’s sentences shimmer in that unsettling, often sugar-laced way she does so well.
We’ve now featured both ‘Bunny’ and ‘We Love You, Bunny’ on the podcast, and if Awad releases another installment in this universe (which she has hinted at), we’ll absolutely be reading that too.
Because whether we understand it fully or not…
We love you, Bunny.
