Review: Hello Bunny Alice

This is the fourth novel by a writer who revels in mixing murder with dysfunctional relationships while uncovering motivations that lurk in the dark side of the mind. Like her previous work, this one comes all wrapped together in a darkly-compelling yarn. The theme of how skeletons (quite literally) from the past threaten the lives of the living are explored in the blackest way imaginable.

The book opens with the sepia-tinted recollections of a former bunny-girl 'Alice' Jones, now living a lonely life in an isolated farmhouse in Oxfordshire. She dwells upon the memory of her complex relationship with former comedy-man Lenny Maxted, one-half of a highly successful 1960's double act. Lenny washed up his career with alcohol and committed suicide, much to the anguish of Alice as well as his partner Jack Flowers. Now in 1976, seven years after Lenny ended his life at the short end of a rope, Flowers appears at Alice's door in a somewhat distressed manner. Alice alarmed at Flowers condition, becomes even more concerned when anonymous newspaper cuttings arrive on her doormat revealing that bones have been discovered from a lake in Wiltshire. The bones it is revealed were found inside a sports-car that was once owned by Lenny Maxted. As Flowers becomes unhinged, Alice explores her past life, and her relationships with Lenny, Flowers, their homosexual agent, and the people that bounced around those heady days of porno-sex, drugs and drink that formed the late 1960's London celebrity scene.

For a dark novel, there is a sprinkling of humour, but even so, it is a book set well into the shadows. Soon the cracks from the past widen and Alice's wonderland world transforms into a living and bleeding nightmare. This is a novel about deeply flawed people, mistakes, excess, and regret that soon turns the sepia view into a blood-red vista, as the truth exacts its heavy price.

If a fusion of Barbara Vine and Patricia Highsmith is your bottle of hemlock, then this Bunny's for you. Highly recommended.

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Ali Karim - RAM

Book Review: Hello Bunny Alice