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3.49 AVERAGE
3.49 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Helen Langford does a good job narrating the audiobook.
The unique premise of the story kept me engaged.
The ending felt abrupt but it mirrors the abruptness that the characters experience.
It’s a poetic social commentary and it’s not a particularly flattering take on humanity.
There is plenty to discuss around the role the human animal plays in relation to all living beings.
There is plenty to discuss around communication and the hindrance of communication- around self-sabotage, ownership, love and connection, society and what it means to live in community. Power is also a theme.
Not a book everyone will “get” - it’s challenging and the main character is hard to love, but I do think it’s worth a read if the themes are engaging to you.
The unique premise of the story kept me engaged.
The ending felt abrupt but it mirrors the abruptness that the characters experience.
It’s a poetic social commentary and it’s not a particularly flattering take on humanity.
There is plenty to discuss around the role the human animal plays in relation to all living beings.
There is plenty to discuss around communication and the hindrance of communication- around self-sabotage, ownership, love and connection, society and what it means to live in community. Power is also a theme.
Not a book everyone will “get” - it’s challenging and the main character is hard to love, but I do think it’s worth a read if the themes are engaging to you.
Honestly my brain is still vibrating from this book. It is so totally weird—but in the best way. It’s like if Contagion met The Overstory and got drunk at a wildlife reserve. The way I sobbed at a certain interaction with some pigs should be enough to make you read on with this review.
The story follows Jean, a rough-around-the-edges wildlife park worker with a penchant for drinking, swearing, and generally making questionable life choices. When a strange pandemic sweeps through Australia, infecting people with the ability to understand animals, things get unhinged. And not in a whimsical Dr. Dolittle way—this is chaotic, unsettling, deeply existential communication. It’s not just oh, "the dog says it loves you"! It’s dingo poetry, bats screaming cryptic nonsense and moths who are obsessed with the moon.
What McKay does so brilliantly is avoid sentimentality with an idea that could have ended up incredibly twee. It isn’t some heartwarming humans-and-animals-finally-understand-each-other tale. Instead, it’s raw, often disturbing, and so immersive. The way Jean barrels through the world—messy, flawed, and weirdly lovable—grounds the story in something grittily real, even as it spirals into surreal territory.
The writing? Sharp. Punchy. Occasionally stomach-turning. The animal dialogue is wild (literally and figuratively). And I have to say, I loved how McKay didn’t give us easy answers. What does true interspecies communication mean? How do we handle knowing that animals see us as just another part of the landscape—sometimes fascinating, often infuriating, rarely special? Existential crisis, table for one.
Why not a perfect 10? A few moments dragged in the second half, and sometimes the bleakness became a lot. But overall, this is an utterly original book—smart, strange, and slightly fever-dreamish in the best way.
If you like dystopian fiction with a bite (pun absolutely intended), The Animals in That Country is unsettling, brilliant and 100% worth reading. Just... maybe don’t read it while making eye contact with your dog. You might not like what it has to say.
The story follows Jean, a rough-around-the-edges wildlife park worker with a penchant for drinking, swearing, and generally making questionable life choices. When a strange pandemic sweeps through Australia, infecting people with the ability to understand animals, things get unhinged. And not in a whimsical Dr. Dolittle way—this is chaotic, unsettling, deeply existential communication. It’s not just oh, "the dog says it loves you"! It’s dingo poetry, bats screaming cryptic nonsense and moths who are obsessed with the moon.
What McKay does so brilliantly is avoid sentimentality with an idea that could have ended up incredibly twee. It isn’t some heartwarming humans-and-animals-finally-understand-each-other tale. Instead, it’s raw, often disturbing, and so immersive. The way Jean barrels through the world—messy, flawed, and weirdly lovable—grounds the story in something grittily real, even as it spirals into surreal territory.
The writing? Sharp. Punchy. Occasionally stomach-turning. The animal dialogue is wild (literally and figuratively). And I have to say, I loved how McKay didn’t give us easy answers. What does true interspecies communication mean? How do we handle knowing that animals see us as just another part of the landscape—sometimes fascinating, often infuriating, rarely special? Existential crisis, table for one.
Why not a perfect 10? A few moments dragged in the second half, and sometimes the bleakness became a lot. But overall, this is an utterly original book—smart, strange, and slightly fever-dreamish in the best way.
If you like dystopian fiction with a bite (pun absolutely intended), The Animals in That Country is unsettling, brilliant and 100% worth reading. Just... maybe don’t read it while making eye contact with your dog. You might not like what it has to say.
As a person who tends to handle animals better than she handles people, I found the premise of this book fascinating . Based on all the various blurbs, it seemed like Jean, who most reviews/summaries just label "ornery" or "grouchy" might be a character to whom I could relate. Instead she's an alcoholic actively sabotaging her own life and family and becomes responsible for infecting her coworkers and grandchild with the "zooflu."
A lot of negative reviews focus on how the animals "talk" and I actually didn't have a problem with that on the surface - even if we knew the words they were saying, I doubt we'd ever understand the meaning. Though how much their "speech" added to the story itself (other than proving Jean is bad at her job for having tried to ascribe human emotions/voice to animals) is questionable.
Finally, I was extremely annoyed at the descriptions of zoo animals being like humans who were institutionalized - it drives them "crazy" according to the book. I've worked in animal husbandry for most of my professional career, and I've had a family member who was institutionalized for their safety and that of others. The book's implications that people and animals are inherently being abused and mistreated in these situations is just wrong.
A lot of negative reviews focus on how the animals "talk" and I actually didn't have a problem with that on the surface - even if we knew the words they were saying, I doubt we'd ever understand the meaning. Though how much their "speech" added to the story itself (other than proving Jean is bad at her job for having tried to ascribe human emotions/voice to animals) is questionable.
Finally, I was extremely annoyed at the descriptions of zoo animals being like humans who were institutionalized - it drives them "crazy" according to the book. I've worked in animal husbandry for most of my professional career, and I've had a family member who was institutionalized for their safety and that of others. The book's implications that people and animals are inherently being abused and mistreated in these situations is just wrong.
adventurous
challenging
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Unpleasant, uninteresting people got involved in unpleasant, uninteresting animals and in the confusion that followed there was a lot of collapse. Then there wasn't.
I've not read anything quite like this book. If you think that understanding what animals are saying will be like Dr Dolittle, think again. The communication in this book seems a bit more realistic. The main plot of the book seemed a bit contrived but the animal communication was fascinating. A unique idea.
Fantastic storytelling. Loved the talking animals - as KIm Hill desrcibed their language as gnomic haiku. It took me some time to attune to it, and I will want to go back and read it again to get more meaning.
The plot was thrilling and the characters completely believable. The end was gripping, and satisfying.
The talking animals made me think back to "the knife of letting go" by Patrick Ness, who gave us a different view of the world from the animal's POV. But Laura goes so much farther =- the character of the dingo Sue is so vivid: she has a full personality, and a complex relationship with Jean, the protagonist.
And the whale talk was brilliant.
The plot was thrilling and the characters completely believable. The end was gripping, and satisfying.
The talking animals made me think back to "the knife of letting go" by Patrick Ness, who gave us a different view of the world from the animal's POV. But Laura goes so much farther =- the character of the dingo Sue is so vivid: she has a full personality, and a complex relationship with Jean, the protagonist.
And the whale talk was brilliant.
Lost interest and didnt find the world in epidemic to be believable. For instance when Jean goes to see her mother in the care home and they are carrying on as normal and being jolly. did not finish
McKay explores the idea of 'zooflu' where humans and animals can understand each-other this book unfortunately didn't keep me as invested as I'd hoped.
Personally I found the main character unlikeable and therefore didn't really get to feel a connection with her and although it was cool that the animals spoke in such a complex and intriguing way I struggled to understand them and therefore the storyline as well.
I do love the premise of the story it just wasn't the book for me
Personally I found the main character unlikeable and therefore didn't really get to feel a connection with her and although it was cool that the animals spoke in such a complex and intriguing way I struggled to understand them and therefore the storyline as well.
I do love the premise of the story it just wasn't the book for me
I was SO BORED. I skipped to the talking animals bit and it was just unintelligible so I decided to be done with it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Pandemic/Epidemic