I wasn’t a fan. I think I was expecting something darker from the description. It just wasn’t for me. Younger readers may enjoy it.

This book had me based on the promise of dark academia set at an all girls private school but I struggled with it. It took me a while to get interested and unfortunately in the end I was underwhelmed.

I’ll begin this review the way I’ve had to begin way too many reviews before it: Please stop labeling books as Dark Academia just because they are set at a school.

This is not Dark Academia, and leaves the book at a disadvantage from the outset because the reader is expecting something different. I enjoy the school setting whether it’s truly DA or not, but I don’t love being misled.

This is mostly about mass hysteria, which I don’t think is an especially compelling subject on its own, and this needed another element along side that to help keep the reader invested. If you just want to read about teenage girls and mass hysteria, Megan Abbott wrote a really good novel called The Fever that fits the bill.

What’s good about this one is the setting, which is really unique for a school novel and pretty well-rendered. And the writing itself is fine, though a lot of the secondary characters are sort of fuzzy archetypes who aren’t especially singular. The girls mothers, for example, pretty much all read as the same person.

This 352 page young adult mystery, thriller could possibly be classified as magical realism, or speculative fiction, I'm not really sure, but I do know, that my expectations were really low, and I was so pleasantly surprised by how the story pulled me in and kept me engaged.  Told primarily by dual points of view, Khadijah and Rachel, the book offers commentary on sexual assault and believing victims.  The book starts with a trigger warning of "ghosts and monsters, some of whom hide beneath human faces. It includes discussions and descriptions of sexual assault, trauma, and PTSD," before diving in to a prestigious Malaysian girls school full of secrets, hysteria, and a past that seems to be repeating itself.  There are no religious identity crisis or issues, the student body is diverse and it is a non-issue, Khadijah recites Ayat ul Kursi, makes time to pray, and wears hijab as she tries to figure out what is making the students at St. Bernadette's scream, what happened to those that have gone missing, and how to overcome the trauma that has made her stop speaking.  The symbolism is solid, the book starts out with the screams, but builds on it by adding backstory to the main characters, mystery with the disappearance, and numerous red herrings to keep the reader guessing.  I told myself to get to the midpoint before calling it quits, but once I was there, I read the second half of the book in one sitting. I appreciated that the book was unique, there was no relationship side stories, the cultural authenticity heightened the reading experience, and that I understood the haunting magical elements. 

SYNOPSIS:

St. Bernadette's is an old prestigious all-girls school, but one day a chain reaction of girls screaming starts and the hysteria doesn't seem to be stopping any time soon.  When Khadijah, who is dealing with her own trauma of being sexually assaulted by her step-father, starts to look into the causes, more questions than answers arise.  In efforts to protect her younger sister, Khadijah discovers not only has this happened as their school before, but it doesn't stop with the screaming, and the shadows, last time a girl went missing.

Rachel's life is controlled by her single mother, who is determined that Rachel is successful and a reflection of how perfect and successful they are, despite, Rachel's father abandoning them.  When in an act of rebellion Rachel signs up for monologue competition, she plans to get into character, not to become the character.  As Rachel starts to lose her self to the girl with pink lipstick and white ribbons in her hair, she starts to notice sights and sounds around the school, but when she falls victim to the screaming hysteria herself, will anyone care enough to save her?

WHY I LIKE IT:

So often with magical realism, I honestly don't get it, so I'm not sure if my excitement of having it all be clear means the book was a bit simplistic, if I'm getting better the more of the genre I read, or if the writing was just good.  If I'm being honest, it is probably a little bit of all of it.  Often with the author's book, the story is really good, until it is not, and I honestly feel like this is her best book yet, with the threads coming through, the ending feeling satisfying, the pacing being consistent, and the plot not getting lost on tangents and over explanation.

I loved the symbolism of screaming and it being largely brushed aside as society's collective apathy to victims of sexual assault.  No one at the school has answers, no one likes questions being asked, everyone just wants to carry on as if nothing is happening, and the juxtaposition of the silence and the hysteria for me was powerful. A few plot holes were the result of telling over showing such as the case of the Khadijah and her sisters relationship, but that Khadijah stayed largely silent throughout the book, did not mean she was unable to communicate or not present, and I thought it was shown in a meaningful way.  

I liked that the overbearing mom, with high expectations, and lacking emotional maturity was not from the Muslim parent, at least in Western literature, that is a common trope.  But it is worth noting that presumably the rapists mentioned in the story are Muslim.  Their faith is not a factor, but I noticed, and so I do feel that should be shared.

FLAGS:

Sexual assault, ptsd, rape, kidnapping, trauma, hysteria, lying, ghosts, monsters, magic, fear

TOOLS FOR LEADING THE DISCUSSION:
I think this would be a great high school book club read.  The conversation about sexual assault, both in the story and in real life would be important to have in a safe space.  The triggers would require some evaluation if the book is a good fit, but I think the elements that unfold and the commentary on expectation, honesty, trauma, monsters, etc. would create incredible discussion.

The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's is a thought-provoking and timely novel that tackles important issues, such as abuse, mental health, and the silencing of young women. It may not fully satisfy those looking for a fast-paced thriller or traditional horror, but it succeeds in its social commentary and emotional depth. If you’re looking for a story that blends psychological horror with a critical look at societal expectations, this is a book worth picking up—just be prepared for moments of frustration, anger, and reflection.
Not a standard horror read, one that was more the idea of the horror versus genuine scares, this read left me thinking and pondering a lot of themes on adolescent females' lives.

The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's by Hanna Alkaf is a gripping and poignant exploration of the complexities of teenage girlhood, friendship, and mental health. Alkaf skillfully blends humor and heartbreak, creating relatable characters that draw readers into their struggles and triumphs. The narrative’s rich setting and sharp dialogue make it a compelling read that keeps you hooked until the very end. This thoughtful and engaging story shines a light on the pressures faced by young women, making it both timely and impactful.

This book would be one for young adults to keep them reading. I think a young adult would be kept on their toes.

This book is terrifying on two levels. One level is the Malaysian monsters that seem to be haunting the school. Those moments are what give you goosebumps and make you scared to turn off the lights. The second level is more horrifying though because it is the very honest portrayal of sexual assault on teen girls. This book is a raging scream in defiance of staying silent.

Thank you to the publisher and the author for providing an e-ARC of this book. This, in no way, influenced my review.

*“Because all anyone ever asked me about was my pain. My body for their belief, a complete transaction”*

Coming from Catholic schools for most of my life, the pull that this book had on me when I first saw the announcement was palpable. I just know I need to read it; made even more evident since it’s by Hanna Alkaf! I loved The Girl and the Ghost so I had high expectations jumping in on this one. Honestly? I was not disappointed!

The story and plot were full of intrigue: imagine an all-girls school that has a sudden case of mass hysteria with girls literally screaming one by one. You’d be left wondering and wanting to fly through the pages because you badly need the answers pronto.

Paired with the very imaginative and vivid writing, the horrific scenes play out like a classic Asian horror movie in my head as I was reading it, which I really enjoyed!

While the pacing was pretty slow (for me), it painted a chilling and jarring picture of just how deep and messed up the real issue is at this school. Don’t even get me started with the irony of silencing screaming girls! This alone will rile you up and make you so angry because the adults who were supposed to keep these students safe and heard were the ones setting them aside to save face and uphold the school’s reputation for producing only the brightest students; the parents and guardians who were responsible for creating a safe space failed to protect them. That for the girls to be believed, there has to be something extreme and detrimental that has to happen to them first. That they have to be a victim first. That they have to find out for themselves that the shadows lurking aren’t always the ghosts they fear.

Characters like the school’s counselor, Mr. B, were extra infuriating because they mask their judgment and backhanded comments with fake empathy. Because at least with Rachel’s obsessive and perfectionist mother, you’ll have obvious reasons to hate her.

Also at the heart of this story are friends who’ve always been with the girls to show their support and to the friendships made along the way. It realistically displayed how friends can also disappoint us despite having their hearts in the right places. That sometimes we’ll have to sit with our issues and challenges alone before we can open up and trust again.

I’ll have to say, though, that the ending wasn’t fully satisfying. While I’m glad to see character developments towards the end, I felt that with the level of frustrations that the story built up, it wasn’t able to fully realize the same level of satisfaction in having the real villains accountable. I feel like people would just set aside the girls’ account of the events and brush these off as accusations of hysterical runaway girls.

But I guess that’s also the beauty of the ending, you’d just have to trust the girls’ grit, courage, and booming voices.

If you’re going to pick this up (which you should!), prepare to be scared, engaged, and enraged!

This book touched a certain part of me that wished to be ignored. The part that said to be silent, to not ask, to just follow what others told me to. While I had not experienced it myself, I had been a witness, both as a young girl and an adult. It unnerved me, making me wonder what was in their minds. This story - these girls - made us think of what's going in the screamers' life that pushed them to the brink. Where screaming was the only option left to be heard, seen and worried about. Even if it meant being seen as weak, when that was the furthest of who they really were.

Even without the supernatural part, this story relates to everyone who read it, even for a tiny bit. The characters, not just Khad and Rachel, carry the story on their backs, giving the world glimpses of what young girls often have to endure in their lives. I could not help but be angry for them, and for the girls out there who are experiencing the same thing.

I really, really hope this book, this story receives the recognition it deserves. It touches topics that are often swept under the rug, especially when it comes to girls and the pains that they have to go through. Don't ever say it is not relatable in any form; this story is what a lot of people have to live in every day.

Amazing book love the plot line . and love the
character development. Great job love the character names

There's a mystery happening at an all girls school..... there's a screaming hysteria happening and a dark history lurks in the school walls. At St. Bernadette's, an all girl's school, only the brightest and best are formed there yet when a girl suddenly begins screaming... it infects the rest of the school and by the end of the day seventeen girls were impacted. Khadijah and Rachel are two girls who find themselves drawn together to try and solve the school's mystery and uncover the school's dark secret, yet the closer they get the closer another victim is getting ready to be picked. I honestly couldn't really get behind the pacing of this book and while the individual characters were distinct, the actual set up and build of the story felt oddly paced and I found myself getting bored while reading it. The book just didn't really connect with me and I just couldn't find myself immersing in the mystery. While it wasn't for me, if you want a mystery with a school filled with girls and deals with the topics of abuse, then definitely give this one a go.

Release Date: September 24,2024

Publication/Blog: Ash and Books (ash-and-books.tumblr.com)

*Thanks Netgalley and Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing | Salaam Reads / Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

I enjoyed this one. I thought it provided a fantastic commentary on girls who are constantly not being taken seriously in countries where males dominate society. Khadijah and Rachel's journey separately and together was awesome to read about, and the ending of the school finally releasing the girls and defeating the man who was hurting them was so impactful.

I did give this minus a star for the buildup taking up most of the book, and so the eventual defeat didn't feel as impactful as it happened so easily.

This might be my favourite Hana Alkaf book so far. Not just because it appeals to me for ultimately being a dark academia book but for how much I connected and felt the story.

Readers should be warned to read the trigger warnings before getting into this book as it deals with some very heavy topics. But I think this book should be praised for how well these topics are handled.

At its core this book is about women. It’s about how we’re treated by society as a whole. The balance between being the perfect and demure, being told to be seen and not heard, to be independent and self-sufficient, but also being gaslit into believing our pain isn’t real, that our suffering is our own fault, that we’re weak and feeble and need to be protected. The book perfectly shows this with its variety of female characters who all deal with their own different trauma and what we do to protect ourselves from it.

One thing that is often seen within Alkaf’s work is her blend of Malaysian mythology within her writing. While this book touches on mythology it instead uses the concept of screaming hysterics and gives it meaning and ownership. That this isn’t just some case of female hysteria. In a world where women’s voices are never heard - sometimes screaming is the only way.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It was interesting and engaging and as someone who grew up in an Asian household with Asian ideals, I connected with the characters. While I did feel the story dragged slightly at the start of the third act and the conclusion came without a proper “return to normalcy” - it feels like an important book that needed to be told. In a time when women’s voices are being silenced and their trauma is being ignored - this book reflects the society we are in and shows how detrimental it is to the young women in it.

Wow!! This book follows to girls that attend St Bernadette's. The first pov is a young lady who has stopped speaking after the trauma of her step father sexually assaulting her. The 2nd POV is another girl who attends the school who has all the pressure of having the best grades from her mother. At the school one day a girl starts to scream causing a catalyst of other students screaming. The more Khadijah digs into the past she finds out this happened before and a girl went missing back then. This is such a powerful read and I loved that the author included trigger warnings.

Hanna Alkaf’s The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's is an intriguing exploration of adolescent trauma and the societal pressures that exacerbate it. The novel delves into the lives of the young women at a Catholic boarding school, using horror as a lens to magnify their struggles. While the book certainly has its merits, it also presents a mixed bag of experiences for readers.

At its core, the novel attempts to blend psychological horror with a critique of institutional and familial abuses. The premise is promising: a group of girls begins exhibiting bizarre behaviors and symptoms, which seem to be tied to a sinister force within the school. However, the execution leaves something to be desired.

One of the main challenges with the book is its pacing. The narrative lacks a cohesive structure, which affects the buildup of suspense. Instead of a gradual and engaging build-up, the story often feels disjointed. This pacing issue may leave readers feeling more curious than genuinely intrigued or terrified.

Moreover, the novel tackles difficult subjects such as sexual abuse, specifically involving a stepfather, which is a significant trigger warning. The issue here is that while the book does provide a warning about sensitive content, it doesn’t specify that the abuse is perpetrated by a stepfather. For some readers, this detail could be distressing and warrants clearer disclosure.

Despite these concerns, The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's succeeds in its thematic ambitions. It serves as both a cautionary tale for young women and a metaphorical critique of the ways in which institutional and familial pressures can distort and damage lives. The story’s underlying message about confronting and surviving trauma is both powerful and necessary.

In terms of the horror elements, the book falls a bit short of expectations. The horror is more subdued and psychological, and for readers seeking a traditional horror experience with a clear-cut sense of dread, this may be unsatisfying. The horror here is more about the psychological impact of the girls' experiences rather than outright terror.

Overall, The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's is a thought-provoking read with important themes, but it may not fully satisfy those looking for a conventional horror story. Its strengths lie in its social commentary and the portrayal of complex emotional landscapes, though it might benefit from a more focused narrative structure and clearer content warnings.

Thank you to NetGalley, Hanna Alkaf, and Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing for providing me this arc to read in exchange for my honest review.

St Bernadette’s is an esteemed all-girls mission school, and its graduates are known to emerge being some of the brightest women with great futures ahead of them. But when the girls start screaming for no reason at all, and then one goes missing, its reputation might be at risk. But what about the girls, the “hysterical” screamers who might possibly be the next to go missing?

The thing about growing up SEAsian is, haunted school stories are something you grow up with. Everyone’s got a school ghost story, many at the schools we attended ourselves: possession, strange sightings, you name it. THE HYSTERICAL GIRLS OF ST BERNADETTE’S plays up those themes, but what I especially liked was the way it presents the idea that the monsters and the danger isn’t the otherworldly, but something that wears a charming human mask—is, in fact, a human. It is the adults who care more about protecting the school’s sparkling reputation than its own students despite their suffering, despite the disappearances. The same adults who shut down investigations into a missing girl to save the school’s reputation. The adults who dismiss young girls’ suffering and calls for help as them being “too emotional” or “hysterical.” And even worse, the adults who take advantage of the power imbalance and hide behind claimed innocence.

Thank you to the author herself, Hanna Alkaf, for sending me an arc of this amazing book in exchange for a review!

I loved the authors setting for the book. This is a part of the world I am not familiar with. The culture, the clothing and even the words were new to me so it was very interesting.
I don't normally start looking into where a country is on a map, or if there is a history of hysteria actually happening in real life so this book really got me thinking and researching.
Add to that the main story of how women are viewed in society, cultural expectations, and finding your voice and this story really grabs you and coaxes you along on a very interesting story.
There are instances of sexual assault, bullying, and gaslighting that goes on but in many ways it is subtle and isn't graphic or violent.
This is a book worth reading.
Enjoy!

WOW I was not expecting such a riveting horror story when I picked this up - what a read! Dark academic meets murder mystery-esque story with strong female leads? Count me in!

The story took me a little while to get into, mostly because I had a difficult time keeping track of all the characters. Once I picked that up, the rest of the story took off! While a really suspenseful storyline, the major themes and topics were soul-crushing as many of us can relate to them, even today. Khadijah and Rachel were incredibly written characters with strong arcs that were easy to like and connect with.

While a bit mature for some of my students, I still planning on adding this one to my classroom shelves as the messages are so powerful and important. Thanks so much for the ARC!

I just finish this book a while ago and OMG there are so many things I want to share.

First, the characters' complexity. I LOVE HOW Kak Hanna addressed the issues because THE THINGS HAPPENED TO THEM HAPPENED TO A LOT OF YOUNG GIRLS.
- Rachel. The have to be miss perfect. Who crumbled under her mother's pressure. I NEED TO HUG THIS GIRL:( hate how it's true this kind of girl is the most vulnerable to be in predator's den.
- Khad.... The mother-daughter relationship is sending me to a rollercoaster ride. How young teenager girl often has to pay with their bodies or even their lives is hurting. You're understood and loved, Khad. I love how even in her lowest condition, Khadijah is a fighter.
- AND FLO AND SUMI DESERVED ALL THE BEST THINGS IN THE WORLD. Their friendship is the best of all 😭♥️
- Oh and how the headmistress prioritizing the school's reputation over literally everything else? Disappointed but not surprise. Hard pill to swallow. It just reflected the reality how bad our education system actually is.

Second, the issues. I love how Kak Hana made it uncomfortable to read but handled sooo delicately. Surely, it didn't exploitative and the points came across quite well.

Third, the writing. It feels so atmospheric. It gave me goosebumps. It's uneasy (as it should).

Forth, the mystery, the pace, the clues. If you love or an avid reader of CTM, this book might not amaze you as much. Thing is the ending is either a hit or a miss. For me, St. Bernadette's is just so so. The first half was very intriguing. The second half could be faster and I'd love to have the ending and the explanation, the dots connecting to be more elaborated. It felt rushed in the end. But I personally still enjoy it. It's the journey that counts.

Last, the horror. I love horror stories. Urban legends. Mass Hysterical at all girl school. I can see it clearly happening. It felt so close to home. And I love how in the end it remains as a mystery.

Give this book ago. Thanks so much Kak Hana for the arc in exchange of honest reviews. I love it.