TikTok’s repopularization of literature for Gen-Z audiences has sparked a renaissance in various subgenres, including “weird girl” books. Featuring strange, complicated female protagonists and unsettling aspects of the female experience, these titles have surged in popularity thanks to their absurdity, relatability and overall weirdness. Whether it’s a resonance with the title “weird girl” or sheer curiosity, here are five recommendations to envelop oneself in the grotesquely beautiful and surreal world of “weird girl” books.
- “Bunny” by Mona Awad /336 pages
Samantha Mackey is a creative writing graduate student at the elite Warren University. A scholarship student whose only friend is an eclectic art school dropout, she is repelled by the rest of her fiction-writing cohort: a clique of unbearably preppy, rich and beautiful girls who refer to each other exclusively as “Bunny.” Her hatred turns to curiosity when one day, Samantha receives an invitation to their elusive “Smut Salon” where the bunnies workshop their creations together. As the story progresses, reality blurs and both Samantha and the readers struggle to separate truth from imagination.
The unnamed narrator is thin, blonde, beautiful, extremely wealthy and freshly graduated from Columbia University. Set in the year 2000 in the Upper Eastside of Manhattan, the narrator should be happy, but is not. Not because of the death of her parents, her easy job at an art gallery, her evil Wall Street boyfriend, or her sadomasochistic friendship with Reva — it’s something deeper and stronger. The narrator decides that the only way to get rid of this pervasive depression is to seek out sleep as salvation. With the help of an over-prescribing therapist and VHC tapes of iconic 90’s movies, the narrator begins her year of rest and relaxation.
- “Carmilla” by J. Sheridan Le Fanu / 108 pages
“Carmilla” is for the new fans of Robert Eggers’ “Nosferatu” who were hoping for more sapphic romance. Preceding Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” the original story that inspired “Nosferatu,” by 26 years, “Carmilla” follows Laura, a young, isolated girl whose only companion is her father. That is, until a horse-drawn carriage crashes, carrying the beautifully mystifying Carmilla. As the story progresses, the entrancing connection between the two young women grows stronger, while Laura grows ever weaker. The original vampire story, “Carmilla” is filled with gothic imagery and sexual tension.
- “Big Swiss” by Jen Beagin / 336 pages
Greta, peculiar and introverted, spends her days transcribing therapy sessions for a sex coach named Om. Greta soon becomes infatuated with Om’s newest client, a sexually repressed, Swedish married woman she affectionately refers to as Big Swiss. One day, Greta recognizes Big Swiss’s voice while in town and the two quickly form a strong whirlwind relationship. Greta’s desire for Big Swiss overpowers any ounce of guilt she feels for keeping the fact that she knows the Swede’s most intimate secrets to herself, meaning she’ll do anything to protect their connection.
- “Nightbitch” by Rachel Yoder / 256 pages
The main character, referred to only as Mother, is a full-time stay-at-home mom of a two-year-old son, having set aside her art career to do so. Never home, her husband is always calling from faraway hotel rooms while he travels extensively for work. She fears she might lose her mind when her child can’t sleep one night, and she feels her canines grow sharper in her mouth, mysterious patches of fur grow on her neck, and a strange new appetite rise from deep within herself. At night, she finds herself transforming into a dog, but her husband is quick to dismiss her fears. As her symptoms begin to intensify, she seeks out information from her local library and finds herself involved with a group of other moms who are more than they seem.
Whether darkly humorous, eerily surreal, or deeply unsettling, these books capture the weird, wonderful, and often chaotic nature of the female experience, offering stories that linger long after the final page.
