Entrancingly dreamy and perfectly creepy. Mona Awad's newest novel layers beauty and ritual on envy and horror in such an effective way. The shifting language--ugh, it's too good. I'll always recommend Awad to folks looking for unsettling, quick-paced, fairy-tale-esque stories.

3.5 stars

“Mirror, mirror on the wall …”

"Rouge" has me all in a tizzy. I’m so conflicted over how to rate it.

The problem is that I wanted to love it more than I did. And my want-to-love-it is fighting to take control of my review.

Mona Awad's latest is my first foray into her writing: a dark, trippy fairy tale about a woman who loses her mother and then spirals down a dangerous path in search of youth and beauty. Reading very much like a fever dream, the story is filled with gorgeous red, white, and black imagery, and there are shades of "Snow White" and even Tom Cruise (but not really) in its pages.

Throughout the book, Awad fiercely attacks the beauty industry and the pressure it places on women to look younger and be our most beautiful selves. And she makes us question: how much are we willing to sacrifice in order to meet these unreasonable standards?

And Awad handles it so well. Her jabs hit the target, and she’s unapologetic while making them. But as I mentioned above, much of the narrative is written as a surreal, druggy dream, and what happens inside of these dreams isn’t always interesting. Parts feel repetitive and I was bored at times, even though I wanted not to be, more than anything.

I was also looking for a more intricate and nuanced approach to the story and its themes. By the last chapter, Awad spells most everything out, what happens and why, and there isn't much left for us to piece together on our own.

The ending is killer, though. Even without the depth and complexity I craved, if Awad had given us more of what's in the last 50 pages – emotion, horror, and thrills – then I wouldn’t be stuck on a 3.5 star rating.


My sincerest appreciation to Mona Awad, S&S/Marysue Rucci Books, and NetGalley for the digital review copy. All opinions included herein are my own.

As a fan of "Bunny," I was so excited to read "Rouge." This was dark, confusing, and beautiful, getting into it felt like tumbling down Alice's hole into wonderland. Some parts toward the middle and end left me unsure what had just transpired, I was not bothered by not understanding everything that was going on. I would highly recommend this to fans of "weird girl fiction" and Bunny.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon Element for my arc in exchange for my unbiased opinion.

*I sped read this in the past two days since I wasn't able to get to it with my grad school readings*

Mona Awad has quickly become one of my favorite authors. I love her writing style and the stories she tells are always so interesting and so imaginative. I swear, they are a literary genius. "Rouge" is a story about the unrealistic and unhealthy beauty standards that women have and continue to face in our society. It's her brand of story that I personally think she does well. She's able to completely throw the reader into this beautifully toxic and enchanting world of beauty so well! You, like Belle, get to stumble around in a daze being led by the fingertips by dreamy, ghostly figures. I mean, as someone who really enjoys skincare and beauty, I really enjoyed this book.

Like her other books, I can see this one needing a reread or two because although I liked it, there were some things that I didn't necessarily understand even though I liked what I read. I'm not sure if I'm making sense, but essentially the "vibes" were enjoyable. I do think that for most people, this will be too complicated and confusing but if you already enjoy Awad's writing, this will be a fun and enchanting read.

I would definitely recommend this for anyone who loves Mona Awad, gothic surrealism, and complicated books that explore complicated topics and relationships.

This book just really wasn't for me, a little bit too odd and boring. It seems like a lot of people really enjoy and appreciate Mona Awad's writing, so if you're a fan of hers, you will probably like this one too!

This book had so many twists and turns I never knew where it was going to go! It still stays pretty mysterious and a lot goes unanswered. All in all I did enjoy reading it, but by the end it felt like it was dragging and I would’ve liked to see more about the inner workings of Rouge!

Simply stunning. Mona Awad is one of my favorite authors for a reason, and she has never failed with her beautiful, darkly whimsical, distinctly Awad writing.

If you liked Mona Awad’s other books, you’ll likely enjoy this one as well. It has her typical beautifully strange writing and story telling with intricate and intriguing social commentary - this one dealing with the unachievable beauty standards women face today. This whole books feels like you’re stumbling around in a lush, beautiful, strange world that your brain simply cannot fully comprehend. Like her other stuff, I think this is one that will only get better upon reread. I can see where people would struggle, though. It’s hard to get through, hard to@understand, and he’s to want to pick up if you’re already having a hard time with those other issues. I think her books are a ‘you either love em or hate em’ kind of thing and I happen to be in the group that loves em. Definitely a recommendation if you don’t mind reading books that feel like a fever dream.

Thanks again to the publishers for allowing me to read this one early! Rouge was one of my most anticipated releases this year and Awad again shepherds readers into a fever dream where things (i.e. modern-day society) are not always as they seem. It took me a bit longer than her past works to fall under the spell of her writing due to the staccato nature of the prose, but I found the journey to be worth it. Probably not the place to start with Awad, but established fans will find a lot to love here.

a slow-paced, dark fairy-tale with strong themes of destructive beauty/skincare culture, white supremacy, and family trauma. our main character, Mirabelle, is a half-White, half-Egyptian dress shop attendant who is obsessed with skincare YouTube and doesn't have much of a plan for her life. When her mother dies, Mirabelle must travel from Montreal to Southern California to arrange her mother's affairs, and there she discovers that her mother has been deeply unwell, caught up in a mysterious group in the area. I loved the discussion of the topics and I was actually quite drawn to our aloof narrator, but I did find the pacing slower than necessary and wondered whether this might have been more effective as a novela. Nonetheless, an enchanting read that I do recommend.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the electronic advanced readers copy.

Rouge tells the tale of Mirabelle Nour, a beauty-fixated young woman who enters a dark world of secrets and seduction after returning to Southern California in the wake of her estranged mother’s sudden and mysterious death. In a manner similar to her previous novel, Bunny, Awad designs an increasingly bizarre and disorienting descent into obsession and desire that leaves the reader a little bit breathless by the end. Along the way envy, lust, and greed manifest as palpable refractions from a sinister mirror held up to modern society – and the story strips its layers to expose raw truths that we all must determine how to face.

While more obvious connections can be drawn to works like Snow White, The Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland and Eyes Wide Shut, what I found more intriguing was that the surrealism at times reminded me of Jordan Peele’s Get Out – especially in the second half of the book. While they are not as profoundly explored here as they are in Get Out, themes of cultural appropriation, self-hate (on both sides), and racial jealousy are woven organically into Belle’s experience as a mixed Egyptian woman. I would have like to see more of this, but it wasn’t really the main focus of the book.

From an execution standpoint, there were a few dips and misses for me – for example, the slow start was a bit frustrating. Also, while it does effectively convey the obsessive mental state of the main character, the constant rattling off of beauty product names in the beginning of the story gets a little “obtuse rubber goose green moose guava juice” at times – but fortunately it dials back before getting too annoying. Overall I had to push myself a bit early on, but I’m glad I stuck it out.

Dense with abstraction and dripping with metaphor, Rouge is a deeply relatable story that interrogates the ideals of beauty, desire and self-worth through the lens of a fractured relationship between mother and daughter – and their attempts to find both absolution and salvation.

Oh, Bunnies! Read this on your pink iPad mini's!

I didn’t think I was going to love this one as much as Bunny, but I was wrong. This wickedly weird book is right up my alley and I loved every word of it. An easy five stars from me!

Haunting, dark, atmospheric, bizarre - all the things I love in a novel. Mona Awad hit it out of the park with this book on intergenerational trauma and the internal cost of beauty. Adored the ending with Hud "rescuing" her.

Wow! What an odd book that literally felt like a fever dream. Personally, this book was not for me. I did not enjoy the internal thoughts and dialogue of our main character; I wanted out of them.

If you read her previous books and enjoyed them, you may also enjoy this one.

Belle is obsessed with skincare and coping with the loss of her mother when she discovers the mysterious spa that her mother had been receiving “treatments” at. Belle begins to slowly lose her grip on reality after these mind-altering treatments.

Do you remember when rappers used to say a word and then “oops I mean” and then a similar word? Pioneered by Lil Wayne, it got old fast. A lazy form of wordplay. That’s all I could think about every time Belle said a word while meaning to use a similar one.

Mona Awad’s dreamy prose saved this from being a DNF for me. I kept wanting to know more. For me, this book left a lot of unanswered questions and there was a lot that was unclear.

Mona Awad writes deliciously captivating stories. “Bunny” was a win in my book, and I think fans will enjoy “Rouge” just as much.

An incredible literary horror! This book was quite the rollercoaster ride. There were so many moments where I didn’t know what was happening, but I enjoyed every moment of it. I also did not expect to tear up a bit at the end, but sure enough there were a few tear jerking moments.

Read if you like:
- exploring the complexities of mother-daughter relationships
- books that feel like a fever dream
- gothic imagery
- eyes wide shut meets Snow White

Themes: western beauty standards, race, colorism, grief, loss, mental health, cults

Huge thank you to Netgalley for the e-arc, Libro.fm for the ALC, and the publisher for the finished copy!

gothic ! SURREAL ! suspense ! literary horror ! absolutely magnifique !!!!!

with rouge mona awad explores the ever so complex dynamics of a mother-daughter relationship.
and as any other mona book it only gets “weirder” and more confusing as it progresses into a truly twisted and incredibly intense tale.

at the forefront of the story is loss and grief. but the book overall is also a powerful commentary on, and critique of, the beauty industry and how wanting to conform to the beauty ideal can result in loss of self; here obsession and “where to draw the line” plays a significant role. throughout the story, lines can also be drawn to capitalism and how companies feed on women's insecurities; more precisely, ones forced upon us by impossible beauty standards.

the publisher kindly provided this arc through netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you S&S/ Marysue Rucci Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to get a jump on Mona Awad's latest gothic horror novel. Mirabelle (“Belle”), is an acolyte of the over saturated and often overstimulating beauty industry. Snail mucin, micro-currents and marine algae masks are child’s play for Belle who is a devotee of beauty vlogs which tout products to save your “poor, poor neck,” recommend seven different acids because each is necessary to address “a different skin predicament,” and focus on various “skin journeys,” such as a retinoid journey and a post-inflammatory journey. For Belle, who inherited her deceased father’s swarthy complexion and dark hair, it’s all about luminosity, radiance, lifting, plumping to achieve skin like glass without “a hair or a line or a blemish.” By the time she has completed her morning routine, it is early evening.

When Belle’s fair, red-haired mother, Noelle Des Jardins who, as related by her business partner, also “really loved her products,” mysteriously dies falling off a cliff’s edge to the rocks and beach below, Belle travels to La Jolla, California to settle her mother’s affairs. Belle arrives at her mother’s moldering beach-front condo, which is cluttered with red jars and bottles, without extra clothing but with seven ziplock bags full of skin products “because grief afflicts the skin barrier.”

At the funeral, Belle spies a mysterious woman in red who exclaims that Noelle “went the way of the roses.” As Belle contends with her mother’s crushing debts and the sexy handyman who is repairing the decaying condo, she receives an invitation from La Maison de Méduse, a luxurious, cult-like spa where Noelle was among their “most prized members” and where the “secrets go far beyond exfoliation.” Awad has crafted a humorous, contemporary fairy tale that dives into the sinister underbelly of obsessive beauty and the quest for perpetual youth and physical perfection with wry cultural observations of fraught mother-daughter relationships and our society’s obsession with the superficial. “Rouge” illuminates the uneasy truths about being a woman in our anti-aging obsessed society, which itself feels like gothic horror.

What do you do when a book can’t be categorized?
Time for an honest book feedback, review, thing. While I normally give you reasons to read, in this case, I am not even sure how to talk about it. Everytime I read this author, I like the story, but it’s just so strange. I am the type of reader who needs a semblance of realism and groundedness. If there is some type of fever dream, unexplained happenings, I sometimes don’t do well. The main premise of this book is that a woman's mom dies and as she digs closer it might be the work of a Spa masquerading as a cult. It’s categorized as Horror Gothic. The book is definitely memorable, and her writing is genius, but if you are the type of person who needs very clear situations to enjoy a book, this may be a tougher read for you.