Instead, she surrounds herself with animals, working as a guide in an outback wildlife park. McKay is a masterful storyteller, and her talent truly shines in this quest for family and belonging. document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].appendChild(script); ExpressoStore.products = ExpressoStore.products || {}; Acerbic wildlife guide Jean and a dingo named Sue set off through the Australian Outback in pursuit of the former’s son, who has absconded south after losing his mind, like so many others, due to the new voices that now seemingly occupy every space.’, ‘Disturbingly timely, The Animals In That Country chronicles the journey of one no-bullshit woman and her half-wild dingo as they race against a deadly pandemic. Good premise. Surely we love our pets and if they could talk to us they would finally tell us how much they love us too. Laura Jean McKay is the author of Holiday in Cambodia (Black Inc. 2013), shortlisted for three national book awards in Australia. People start liberating animals from zoos, sanctuaries, and farms and the whole continent is a madhouse. A road trip book of pandemic proportions, let down by some structural issues, the story jumping forward in time and place without explanation. Some places may also have a national bird. For me the story, and the way in which it portrayed the effects of ‘Zooflu’ on the world, was more an exploration of language and communication and the place that we have in the natural world around us, than a dystopian pandemic story. By Margaret Atwood. 4.5 stars - A very exciting debut. The premise for The Animals in That Country is quite simple – a flu virus – the ‘zoo flu’ as it becomes known in the book – causes the communication barrier between humans and other animals to disappear. politely to … Goodreads Picks for Tournament of Books 2021, Readers' Most Anticipated Books of February. Saturday 18 April, 2020 Laura Jean McKay’s The Animals in That Country is an eerily prescient story of a novel virus which leaves those affected the ability to communicate with animals. We publish books that matter — narrative and literary nonfiction on important topics, and the best of local, international, and translated fiction. Unique Animals, Unique Nation . The novel becomes both a stirring attempt to inhabit other consciousnesses and a wry demonstration of the limits of our own language and empathy. Laura Jean McKay’s novel wins Victorian Prize for Literature…, The Animals in That Country shortlisted for VPLAs, Laura Jean McKay’s novel shortlisted for the 2021 Victorian Premier’s…, The Animals in That Country shortlisted for the Readings Prize, Laura Jean McKay’s novel up for The Readings Prize for New Australian…, Scribe at the 2020 Melbourne Writers Festival. I will be thinking about this strange book, about Jean and Sue, for a long long time.’, ‘Laura Jean McKay, an expert in animal communication, has her animals speaking in hallucinogenic haikus — it’s disturbing but compelling, and somehow totally believable. Start by marking “The Animals in That Country” as Want to Read: Error rating book. A strange book, very creative and must have caused headaches for the author and her editors. ), the book describes what happens when the flu-like virus spreads across Australia. Set in a recognisable world, but at the time of the appearance of an infectious contagion (sound familiar, anyone? ’, ‘Surprising and surprisingly-convincing characters, and a well-realised, inventive premise.’, ‘A gritty and innovative wonder about an animal-borne virus (yep) that cracks opens channels between interspecies communication. Such a bold and burning story, a fittingly vivid sensory overload. Mireille Juchau, author of The World Without Us. It’s something she wants. The result is an overwhelming cacophony of sound and noise and ceaseless voices, which has the effect of driving many victims completely mad, resorting to all manner of band-aid solutions to try to block out the constant chatter from every living thing. It is her fifth volume of poetry. ‘An imaginative tour de force — assured, compelling, and utterly original, this … McKay's tale pulled me in with its entertaining nature then dragged me under with its profound nuance.’, ‘A fierce debut novel … Her writing about people is filthy, fresh and funny; this is prose on high alert, hackles up and teeth bared in every sentence. It will change the way you view both animals and the world.’, ‘Part pandemic novel and part beast fable, McKay’s novel, which takes its title from a Margaret Atwood poem, imagines a disease that causes humans to understand animal language, down to the lowliest insect. Mireille Juchau author of The World Without Us 'Deliriously strange, blackly hilarious, and completely exhilarating, The Animals in That Country is a wonderful debut from a genuinely original and exciting new voice.' At first I was unsure if this was the best time for me to read pandemic literature during this time. ","store_currency_suffix":""}; ''You're supposed to wear a mask. The result is a raucous fever dream of a road story, evocative of Kenneth Cook, Hunter S. Thompson, and Ceridwen Dovey – but ultimately, McKay defies comparison.’, ‘A timely dystopian novel in which a dangerous flu sweeps across Australia, giving those infected the power to speak with animals, with dark, disturbing results.’, ‘A wildly inventive dystopian adventure … Both a hell of a ride and a revealing thought experiment about our place in the natural world.’, ‘The Animals in That Country is an uncanny book, in no small part because it was released in March and has a pandemic is at its centre … McKay’s book is madcap and poetic by turns; concerned about exactly what constitutes the relationships between humans and animals, and how we see each other and interact in this world we share.’, ‘This book changed the way I look at the relationship between humans and animals, and it has one of the most wonderful dingo protagonists in Sue.’, WINNER OF THE 2021 VICTORIAN PRIZE FOR LITERATUREWINNER OF THE 2021 VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARD FOR FICTIONA SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR. Heraldic national animals are drawings of animals tha… I never thought a substance-abusing grandmother was just who I needed to take me on an apocalyptic road trip — and that long after I gulped the book down, I'd be haunted by the words of a dingo called Sue.’, ‘This is an absorbing and affecting book, and one to which I’m able to pay the highest compliment: that, in the days after finishing it, the world felt different to me, its animals not speaking but not silent either.’, ‘The beauty of this book is that it never quite goes where the reader expects it to go. There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Setting off on their trail, with Sue the dingo riding shotgun, they find themselves in a stark, strange world in which the animal apocalypse has only further isolated people from other species. The Animals in That Country is refreshingly original and totally bonkers, and I read it at a furious pace. A pandemic rips through Australia and those effected have the ability to understand animals. Typically, each country has just one official national animal that is the ultimate representation of the country. Visceral and discombobulating yet tender, The Animals in That Country will appeal to readers who enjoyed the animal-led stories in Ceridwen Dovey’s Only the Animals, and the foreboding road trip in Romy Ash’s Floundering.’, ‘You know when you finish a book and you know that book will occupy your mind for a long time? And although Jean talks to all her charges, she has a particular soft spot for a young dingo called Sue. The Animals in That Country (Scribe 2020) by Laura Jean McKay is certainly one of the most unusual literary novels you’ll ever read. Instead, she surrounds herself with animals… This story will stay with me for a long time, and its protagonist, Jean Bennett, will be with me even longer.’, ‘Deliriously strange, blackly hilarious, and completely exhilarating, The Animals in That Country is a wonderful debut from a genuinely original and exciting new voice.’, ‘McKay is a master at building tension through sparse, abrupt language that mirrors Jean’s decades of alcohol abuse, and the excellent world-building is enhanced by the exquisite chemistry between Jean and her canine companion Sue. However, it took a long time to get into the story and the ending seemed quite abrupt. In fact, 33 countries list national birds. As disturbing news arrives of a pandemic sweeping the country, Jean realises this is no ordinary flu: its chief symptom is that its victims begin to understand the language of animals ― first mammals, then birds and insects, too. Luckily for us, February brings a... To see what your friends thought of this book, An astonishingly immersive experience, with 2 amazing central characters, one a grumpy middle aged woman and one a half-breed dingo. But in this instance where it is a survival story, I genuinely did not care what happened to our main cast. Stella Chrysostomou of VOLUME Books reviews The Animals in That Country by Laura Jean McKay, published by Scribe. Copyright 2021 Scribe Publications. Without a doubt, the premise of this novel was quite interesting and original. What it’s about: A nature documentary that uses advanced camera technology to show the lives of animals at night in natural color. This book is simultaneously laugh-out-loud funny and soul-crushingly depressing, in a way I can only describe as reminiscent of Waiting for Godot.’ FIVE STARS, ‘Funny, original, and heartbreakingly timely. have the faces of people: the ceremonial. Compulsively readable and yet also pushing the boundaries of what is possible in terms of language and narrative, this is a brilliant and disturbing book that will make you rethink everything you thought you understood about non-human animal sentience and agency. It isn't pretty -- it's disturbing -- although the animal speech often reads like modernist poetry. A triumph.’, ‘Engrossing, subversive, and surprisingly profound, The Animals in That Country does something only the best fiction can do: it has the power to skew the reader’s perspective on the world. Apple Important names: The series is narrated by Tom Hiddleston. She's not your typical grandma though. The Animals In That Country certainly doesn’t fall into that camp. Think Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas meets Dr Dolittle. But being able to communicate with non-humans — including mammals, birds and insects — isn’t as wonderful as you might expect, for the messages, random, garbled and incessant, are frightening: the animals are calling for help. Full review to follow. As the flu progresses, the unstoppable voices become overwhelming, and many people begin to lose their minds, including Jean’s infected son, Lee. Laura Jean McKay's powers are in full evidence here: her singular gift for empathy, enviable storytelling chops, and deftly elegant language will shift your frame of reference and leave you altered, in the best of ways. Read 13 reviews from the world's largest community for readers. People who are infected become overwhelmed by their ability to understand the language of the animals around them. Enter our heroine — if you could possibly call her that — Jean, and her animal companion, a dingo called Sue. Millions of pet cats are estimated to kill billions of animals a year but grain-free food can change cat behaviour Published: 11:00 AM . The Animals in That Country avoids the trap of anthropomorphism, showing instead the absurd, intense, and shifting bonds between humans and animals.’, ‘An imaginative tour de force — assured, compelling, and utterly original, this book will change how you see the world. People aren't sure if they're hallucinating or conversing with animals but the whole country has gone mad. A literary spec-fic novel to be published in 2020. All rights reserved. In ‘The Animals in That Country’ by Laura Jean McKay a flu pandemic that causes those infected to communicate with animals spreads across Australia. script.type = "text/javascript"; script.defer = true;

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