Nick Cave: The Death of Bunny Munro

The name Bunny Munro might seem a little too charming and bubbly to have come from the mind of a man as dark as Nick Cave, but if his wide-ranging career has shown an inclination toward anything, it’s unpredictability. 

Best known for fronting rock band the Bad Seeds, Cave’s previous written works include the screenplay for Australian western The Proposition as well as his fiction debut, And the Ass Saw the Angel. The Death of Bunny Munro is his second novel, and the misldeading name belongs to a middle-aged Brit with a mean penchant for sex—the book’s unlikely protagonist. Anyone familiar with this previous work will recognize his twisted black humor, which includes snarky remarks about Kylie Minogue and deranged fantasies of Avril Lavigne. 

This time around, Cave’s seedy comedy introduces us to doomed antihero Bunny Munro, marked by his lack of compassion and corrupted humanity. Bunny is Cave’s Frankenstein monster, culled from radical feminsist Valerie Solanas’ view of men as seen in her S.C.U.M Manifesto. He is a creation that will inspire visceral revulsion—and recognition—in both men and women readers alike. 

Set in three-parts, titled “Cocksman,” “Salesman” and “Deadman,” the novel shows Bunny’s swift regression into sexual perversion, drug use and madness in the aftermath of his wife’s suicide. Left with a decaying house and an emotionally abandoned son, Bunny travels through English seaside towns with the intent of selling beauty wares out of his Fiat Punto. 

The son in particular is a tragic character and the only individual who sees Bunny in a good light. He finds his dad funny and overlooks his failures as a human being, to his own detriment. It’s one of the few ways in which Cave redeems Bunny, and it allows the reader to identify with the son and empathize with the father.

The problem is, the novel’s plot becomes so muddled and confused that it obscures any distinguishable emotional center. Without this, Cave severs the connection between the reader and Bunny, and his attempts to bring father and son closer together fail in producing the intended emotional delivery.