Explore our new BookBrowse Community Forum!

Book Summary and Reviews of The Burrow by Melanie Cheng

The Burrow by Melanie Cheng

The Burrow

by Melanie Cheng

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Published:
  • Nov 2024, 200 pages
  • Rate this book

  • Buy This Book

About this book

Book Summary

A wise and moving story about a family navigating grief, hope, and healing through a bond with a new pet rabbit.

Big-hearted and moving, Melanie Cheng's The Burrow brings together a family trying to find their way forward in the wake of a devastating loss. Parents Jin and Amy Lee adopt a rabbit for their daughter Lucie in the hopes of restoring a bit of joy to their home in the Australian suburbs, and at first, each family member benefits from the distraction of a new creature in need of care. Things are upended when the arrival of Amy's estranged mother breaks their fragile sense of peace, and the family is forced to confront the terrible circumstances surrounding their tragedy and to ask themselves whether opening their hearts to the rabbit will help them to heal, or only invite further sorrow.

With compassion and a keen eye for detail, Cheng tenderly reveals the lives of others―even a small rabbit―in an unforgettable novel about grief, hope, and forgiveness.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"Through restrained and subtle writing that never reveals too much, this novel entices readers to recognize grief's paradoxically discreet nature." ―Booklist

"Each character's bond with the rabbit proves restorative,.... Readers will be moved." ―Publishers Weekly

"Exquisite... A superb balance of unexpected laughter, surprising grace, and the ubiquitous human need for furry love." ―Shelf Awareness

"The Burrow is a beautiful book. Like the grief at its heart, it is restrained and multifaceted. It shows a family existing in isolated parts, struggling to connect, and it explores the moments that bring them together. Each voice is unique and thoroughly engaging. I couldn't put it down." ―Pip Williams, author of The Dictionary of Lost Words

"A small pet rabbit takes on greater meaning in this tight, elegant story of a family quartet reckoning with grief. Melanie Cheng captures the claustrophobic, revelatory strangeness of the early days of the Covid lockdown while bravely mining complexities of human emotion―fear, guilt, anger, and love―in lovely, lucid prose that glitters throughout with cut stones of wisdom." ―Lauren Acampora, author of The Paper Wasp

"Gulped it. I've been a Melanie Cheng fan since our first books came out. But this one is next level―it conveys so much human experience so sparingly that it seems to defy the laws of gravity. Stunning." ―Sarah Krasnostein, author of The Trauma Cleaner and The Believer

This information about The Burrow was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Melanie Cheng

Melanie Cheng is an award-winning author and doctor based in Melbourne, Australia. Her writing has been published in the Guardian, The Age, The Saturday Paper, and The Big Issue, among many others.

More Author Information

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more literary fiction...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Our Evenings
    Our Evenings
    by Alan Hollinghurst
    Alan Hollinghurst's novel Our Evenings is the fictional autobiography of Dave Win, a British ...
  • Book Jacket: Graveyard Shift
    Graveyard Shift
    by M. L. Rio
    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
  • Book Jacket: The Sisters K
    The Sisters K
    by Maureen Sun
    The Kim sisters—Minah, Sarah, and Esther—have just learned their father is dying of ...
  • Book Jacket: Linguaphile
    Linguaphile
    by Julie Sedivy
    From an infant's first attempts to connect with the world around them to the final words shared with...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

A book may be compared to your neighbor...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

F the M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.