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This was an interesting book that provoked a lot of discussion. A few people found it hard to get into and I wonder whether that's a downside of world building as the story goes, instead of frontloading it. On the upside, the setting felt very rich and convincing, and some online reviewers identifying themselves as Thai have praised its grasp of Thai culture. The choice of point of view characters was interesting, as was the switch between Jaidee and Kanya. Hock Seng, in particular, seems to have been included more for reasons of tone or theme than for the overall plot. All of the characters are compromised in one way or another, probably Anderson most of all, which makes opening the book with him another interesting choice. The same ambiguity runs through to the end of the book, which feels positive but is more suggestive than conclusive and not free of tensions. Overall, a very rewarding read.

The message of this novel is that random acts of senseless violence are not random or senseless. It demonstrates this by taking a 12 year old girl from a nice, middle class family and relentlessly brutalising her until she becomes a monster. It is one of the most depressing books I've ever read. From the very start, it's obvious that Lola's family have had their happiest day and that every turn of the page is going to make things worse. I immediately had the urge to stop reading and that didn't go away until I'd finished the book.

The story is very well written. The gradual transformation of Lola's language was particularly striking. The book's message is executed with clarity and ruthlessness. It's maybe too unrelenting for its own good, more a howl of rage than a winning argument. I suspect the people who would benefit from this book's perspective and the people who would choose to read it are two different groups.

The other obvious difficulty with this book, from the perspective of the 2020s, is the relationship of the author to the material. It's hard to imagine a white, male author now crossing lines of race, gender, sexuality and class the way Womack does. It's interesting that what could be seen as overcoming exciting challenges in the 1990s could be taken as paternalism or even colonialism now. It's also interesting that it's harder to treat a book that recent as an artefact of another era, especially when the setting is so close to contemporary.

Altogether this is a very challenging book and it's hard to rate it on a simple scale between bad and amazing.

No, no, no!

Apparently this book has lots of positive reviews online, which makes me think I'm missing something, because I did not enjoy it. On the one hand, it was cartoonish: a city of animals who behave like people, with differences between species played for laughs; a powerful corporation secretly run by stereotypical gangsters from their basement lair; the heroes easily infiltrating the criminal gang; saving the day with musical cliche. On the other hand, it was gritty: genocide; Serena's suffering in slavery; kidnap, murder and as near as cannibalism; the death of a central character. For me, the dissonance between these two tones was off putting and made the story a bit of a muddle. I found the number of characters in the titular band confusing to start with and a distraction in the long run, diluting any affection I might have felt for them. Fair to say, this was not really my thing.

There was a lot of discussion at the meeting about how much this book reflected the time and life of its author. The near absence of female characters in the book was a particular criticism. The mitigating suggestion that the book may be a representation of the author's wartime experiences in an all-male environment was an interesting one. Both Hazel's colony and Woundwort's are militarized, and Adams expresses a sympathy and admiration for Wounwort that is lacking altogether from his portrayal of Cowslip's creepy civilian colony. There does seem something Nietzschean about Adams' philosophy, if that's not too absurd a claim to make regarding a story about talking bunnies. Hazel's creativity in overcoming adversity and even seeking adversity is idealised, living up to the rabbits' lively myths. He draws his followers into his schemes and inspires them to emulate him. Woundwort's impressive efforts to utterly vanquish all risk from his followers' lives ends by stifling them and making them miserable. Cowslip's abdolute rejection of the vigorous myths and passive acceptance of a comfortable life of slavery render him and his colony contemptible. This is perhaps a book best read as a record of personal experience and ideals.

Whilst there is a lot to admire in this story of rabbits trying to find the promised land, the portrayal of gender relationships between the rabbits is incredibly dated now and and it's really a surprise to learn that the author wrote this originally for his daughters. The female rabbits are treated as nothing more than commodities by the main characters and the terrifying villain General Woundwort (who doesn't seem to care for gender politics as long as you pull your weight) actually comes across as a far more sympathetic character than Hazel or Bigwig or Fiver or the rest.

It has a slight hark back to the halcyon days of olde worlde England which mirrors Tolkein at his worst but to give Adams his due he doesn't conform to Tolkein's idea that everyone is born to their place and kings are born and bred not made (Woundwort is essentially an orphan who rose to power by skill and brutality; Hazel is not from some romantic royal bloodline). He presents a world in which everyone can become a hero, everyone can rise to power... Well... Unless you're female.

This book was a bit disappointing. In some ways it was formulaic, for example in its central love triangle. At the same time it seemed to sprout any number of plot strands that didn't go anywhere. What were all the villagers doing so mysteriously in the middle of the night near the start of the book? Other revealed mysteries, like the old priest's daughter pretending she couldn't speak, didn't actually seem to add much to the story. Overall it felt very pessimistic, the overarching mystery leading only to selfishness, brutality and superstition.