Imagine a flat full of people, full of their lives, dreams. Now imagine one horrible night, where these all come together through an act of horror and violence. Welcome to The Rabbit Hutch and be ready to have your heart broken ever (not so) slightly. Thanks to Oneworld Publications and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. My sincere apologies for the delay.

Blandine, the heart of The Rabbit Hutch, has become obsessed with female mystics from the Middle Ages. As someone who works with medieval literature, including the occasional saint's life, I connected with Blandine over this. There is something about female saints and mystics which is revolutionary. In a world and a religion governed by men, these women found and forged paths and lives for themselves which included connection, conversation, education, glory, and pain. I've been intrigued with these mystics myself, with how their piety mixes with a fiery nature. Through Blandine's focus on them, I came to understand her more. The obsession with the mystics, with their impassioned, almost over-the-top approach to life, also fits to the novel's general vibe. The Rabbit Hutch is dream-like and a bit manic at times, a story impacted by the town's dying industry, its summer heat, its lack of opportunities. It is a fantastical narrative, with characters and storylines that don't feel grounded. But this, I believe, is all on purpose as Tess Gunty takes us on a fever dream trip through a variety of lives.

One night something violent happens at the Rabbit Hutch, a housing complex in Vacca Vale. Over the next 400+ pages, Tess Gunty shows you the different inhabitants of the Rabbit Hutch and how their lives led up to this one, fateful night. There is Blandine and her three male roommates, all fresh out of the foster system. Their story and their relationships form the nexus of the storm that is brewing. Next in relevance, or perhaps in how much we find out about here, is Joan, an obituary writer who feels stuck on the sidelines of her own life. I also connected strongly to the story of a new mother, oddly afraid of her new baby's eyes. Some of the side-characters weren't really all that intriguing to me, or rather, I didn't connect as much to them, like the dying TV-star and her son. But they did add to the overall delightful weirdness of The Rabbit Hutch.

This is a debut novel, which amazed me because it is such a confident and controlled narrative. While some elements could have been trimmed down, or made more relevant, such as some of the side characters, there was a really solid thrust to the narrative. I also enjoyed the ways in which Gunty played with different narrative forms for different characters. She doesn't do so consistently, but at times something else will peek through, like the drawings made by one of the characters. One (smallish) complaint I do have is that, while I enjoyed Blandine as a character, there is a manic pixie dream girl-aspect to her as well, to her intelligence, her glamour, her troubled life. When we're in Blandine's head, this didn't get to me as much, but when you see her through the eyes of other characters she sometimes feels a little too unreal. I appreciate this is part of the storyline, but it could have been tweaked a little. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for future books by Tess Gunty.

The Rabbit Hutch surprised me and gripped me in a way I wasn't quite expecting. Blandine is an intriguing character and her obsession with mystics had me pick up a biography of Hildegard of Bingen. So, this novel will seep into you!

Completely stunned by this weird, funny, smart, shocking book. Where does a writer come up with this?! An apartment building in forgotten Vacca Vale, a herd of inhabitants all with their own complexities and devastations, a man from a long ways away who seeks to destroy them (or one of them). Oh my lord, this is a strange adventure. I was hooked.

It's incredible to say this is a debut. The Rabbit Hutch is so intelligently woven together, and centred around a rundown appartment block in the dying town of Vacca Vale, Indiana. Blandine, a teenager who is venturing out into the world for the first time, is definitely the star of this book. Not perfect, but *real*. The town and the people in it are dreaming of rebirth. But as we all know, this is not how you escape your problems. The Rabbit Hutch is a very memorable and special book that will stick with you forever.

Winner of the National Book Award 2022
After several re-starts and now 65 % in, I'm finally capitulating: I just can't get into this and I keep drifting off.

The title-giving "Rabbit Hutch" is a crumbling housing complex in Vacca Vale, a fictional town in Indiana. The Rust Belt dwellings inhabit the typical problems one expects, like poverty, unemployment, and a general air of resignation. As the text jumps from one inhabitant to the next, we learn how different tenants live in these surroundings, while the shadowy equivalent of a protagonist is 18-year-old Blandine, a young woman who, in sentence numero uno, exits her body - what this means? This questions drives the story.

So Gunty certainly has a heart for the American Midwest (much like your humble reviewer, a Minnesota aficionada) and intends to investigate how people deal with gentrification, alienation, and the decline of traditional industries (here, the car company is called Zorn, which, fyi, is the German word for wrath / rage). She also offers some diverse and quirky characters, but for me, the assemblage of various destinies did not quite come together, and I wasn't invested in any of them.

To be fair though, I do not feel like this is a bad book, it's just not for me: Too meandering, too broadly scoped for my taste.

3.5/5
An unforgettable and uncomfortable read. I can imagine this book being studied years into the future with regard to its form, flair, and originality - but it's not what I'd call an enjoyable read - and despite many readers finding it funny, I didn't.

I would struggle to be able to review this book due to issues with the file/download. The issues stopped the flow of the book. The issues are:
- Missing words in the middle of sentences
- Stop/start sentences on different lines
- No clear definition of chapters.

I’m not sure if it was a file/download issue but there were lots of gaps and stops/starts which really ruined the flow. I would love the chance to read a better version as the description of the book appeals to me. I would be more than happy to re-read the book with a better file or as a physical book as the book topic and genre are of interest to me. If you would like me to re-review please feel free to contact me at thesecretbookreview@gmail.com or via social media The_secret_bookreview (Instagram) or Secret_bookblog (Twitter). Thank you.

I had some issues with this book. I got 20 percent through it and realised i just can't keep reading it. I don't know if it's a good book, but I didn't care about anything, and it jumps around between a lot of perspectives, and I don't really care about any of them.. Maybe it will come together in some clever way, but I cannot gather the enthusiasm to keep reading this to find out. And I know I'm meant to forgive formatting problems in Advanced Reader Copies, but I don't know why publishers send out e-Arcs where the formatting is messed up. I know I'm meant to be reviewing the content, but it's hard not to be distracted. I read for pleasure, and this is giving me none.

Two stars because it could get better.

This book has such an interesting premise focusing on Blandine, a teenage girl, who has recently left the care system and moved in to a delapidated apartment block known as The Rabbit Hutch along with the other tenants within the apartment block.
It is well written with a compelling storyline and well developed characters - including a wide range of minor characters that all belong in the rabbit hutch or have some sort of connection to the apartment block.
I really enjoyed this book, it was dark at times and does have some trigger warnings but these are necessary to the plot to bring things together seamlessly. I really liked it.

This book was very well written and funny in places and I normally enjoy books which are a bit outside the box however this one just didn't really do it for me.

I would still recommend people to read it though, as I think it is just personal preference as opposed to anything wrong with the novel. Its a good book, just not for me.

Tess Gunty’s ‘The Rabbit Hutch’ is primarily focused on a teenage girl called Blandine who has recently aged out of the foster care system and now shares an apartment in a decaying apartment building nicknamed ‘the rabbit hutch’, with 3 teenage boys in the same situation. Blandine is strikingly beautiful, extremely clever and plagued by past experiences and people who have harmed her, turning to books and female mystics for escape.

I was surprised to find that the book also heavily revolves around a range of other characters who either live in ‘the rabbit hutch’, or are connected to it in some way as the US synopsis only really mentions Blandine. These residents include an online obituary writer, a young mother terrified of her baby’s eyes, a man who covers himself in the liquid of broken glow sticks and breaks into peoples houses, teenage boys who sacrifice animals and more.

Every character in this book is extremely messy, flawed, complex and strange which I absolutely loved and it was so interesting to follow all of their separate storylines as they ultimately weave together at the end. This novel reminded me of a couple other books I really enjoyed including ‘The Pump’ by sydney warner brooman, ‘Luckenbooth’ by jenni fagan and ‘Paradise Block’ by alice ash, in the way all 4 books are set in decaying apartment buildings or towns and allow you peeks into various characters lives as they intersect.

Littered with voodoo dolls, abandoned car factories, old money, loneliness, violence and community, this novel culminates in an act of violence that changes everything and brings the characters together. Please check trigger warnings if that’s the sort of thing you need as there are cases of animal abuse, a teacher who grooms an underage girl and things like that- but overall I was really pleasantly surprised by this book and enjoyed it for all its weirdness ✨

Rounding up to three stars

A truly mixed bag for me. At times I was racing through it and enjoying the oddness of the stories and the characters. At other times I was a little bit uninterested.

The weird bits outweighed the other bits.
There were many weird bits.
It's an unusual book, and I'm sorry I didn't enjoy it more.