Genre Fiction
![Laura Jean McKay - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B00QO3F5YS.jpg)
The Animals in That Country
Out on the road, no one speaks, everything talks.
Hard-drinking, foul-mouthed, and allergic to bullshit, Jean is not your usual grandma. She's never been good at getting on with other humans, apart from her beloved granddaughter, Kimberly. Instead, she surrounds herself with animals, working as a guide in an outback wildlife park. And although Jean talks to all her charges, she has a particular soft spot for a young dingo called Sue.
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. As the flu progresses, the unstoppable voices become overwhelming, and many people begin to lose their minds, including Jean's infected son, Lee. When he takes off with Kimberly, heading south, Jean feels the pull to follow her kin.
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. Bold, exhilarating, and wholly original, The Animals in That Country asks what would happen, for better or worse, if we finally understood what animals were saying.
Hard-drinking, foul-mouthed, and allergic to bullshit, Jean is not your usual grandma. She's never been good at getting on with other humans, apart from her beloved granddaughter, Kimberly. Instead, she surrounds herself with animals, working as a guide in an outback wildlife park. And although Jean talks to all her charges, she has a particular soft spot for a young dingo called Sue.
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. As the flu progresses, the unstoppable voices become overwhelming, and many people begin to lose their minds, including Jean's infected son, Lee. When he takes off with Kimberly, heading south, Jean feels the pull to follow her kin.
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. Bold, exhilarating, and wholly original, The Animals in That Country asks what would happen, for better or worse, if we finally understood what animals were saying.
Editorial Reviews
"This is a game-changing, life-changing novel, the kind that comes along right when you need it, and compels you to listen to its terrifying poetry. 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. I don't think any reader can ever forget a voice like Sue the dingo's―wise and obscene in equal measure. A triumph."
―Ceridwen Dovey, author of Only The Animals
"In this warm, wild, and irreverent debut, Laura Jean McKay takes us into the minds of animals to reveal the complexity of their lives. The Animals in That Country avoids the trap of anthropomorphism, showing instead the absurd, intense, and shifting bonds between humans and animals."
―Mireille Juchau, author of The World Without Us
"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. This story will stay with me for a long time, and its protagonist, Jean Bennett, will be with me even longer."
―J.P. Pomare, author of Call Me Evie
"Weird, wonderful and strangely moving. I will be thinking about this strange book, about Jean and Sue, for a long long time."
―Eloise Grills, author of Big Beautiful Female Theory
"McKay is a master of voice-driven narrative. 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."
―Sofija Stefanovic, author of Miss Ex-Yugoslavia
"Deliriously strange, blackly hilarious, and completely exhilarating, The Animals in That Country is a wonderful debut from a genuinely original and exciting new voice."
―James Bradley, author of Clade
"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"
―Maxine Beneba Clarke
"An imaginative tour de force―assured, compelling, and utterly original, this book will change how you see the world. 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. A unique and important work that explores the bond between humans and animals―and indeed throws the whole dividing line between us into doubt."
―Meg Mundell, author of The Trespassers
―Ceridwen Dovey, author of Only The Animals
"In this warm, wild, and irreverent debut, Laura Jean McKay takes us into the minds of animals to reveal the complexity of their lives. The Animals in That Country avoids the trap of anthropomorphism, showing instead the absurd, intense, and shifting bonds between humans and animals."
―Mireille Juchau, author of The World Without Us
"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. This story will stay with me for a long time, and its protagonist, Jean Bennett, will be with me even longer."
―J.P. Pomare, author of Call Me Evie
"Weird, wonderful and strangely moving. I will be thinking about this strange book, about Jean and Sue, for a long long time."
―Eloise Grills, author of Big Beautiful Female Theory
"McKay is a master of voice-driven narrative. 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."
―Sofija Stefanovic, author of Miss Ex-Yugoslavia
"Deliriously strange, blackly hilarious, and completely exhilarating, The Animals in That Country is a wonderful debut from a genuinely original and exciting new voice."
―James Bradley, author of Clade
"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"
―Maxine Beneba Clarke
"An imaginative tour de force―assured, compelling, and utterly original, this book will change how you see the world. 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. A unique and important work that explores the bond between humans and animals―and indeed throws the whole dividing line between us into doubt."
―Meg Mundell, author of The Trespassers
Readers Top Reviews
MorganThe Tea LadySp
I bought this as it had won the Victorian Premiers Award for Fiction. I would like to think the competition must have been dreadful but I suspect it was more because it had a pandemic as its theme. It strikes me as the sort of book you would consider writing at the closing of an over-long road trip. The writing is pedestrian, the characters stock and its thesis ill-thought out and internally illogical. The less said about the animals' speech the better. Considering the amount of grants, residencies and editorial assistance the writer got it's surprising that nobody halted the whole thing. Perhaps that is the reason and this is the sort of book you get with residencies.
Tony Wrench
This book is a scorcher. Wild, inventive, raw, anarchic and radical inits imagination. I would expect her to win significant awards.
Tom ScottAlan H
A virus with a side effect that allows people to (kinda) communicate and understand animals via cryptic, even poetic, messages emanating off various body parts? A dystopian road story about a woman and a dingo? Really, how can you go wrong? Here’s how: you feature uniformly unredeemed, crass, trashy characters (including the dingo, for crissake!), a confusing and half-baked narrative, and sloppy dashed-off writing. Such a wonderful premise. Such horrible execution. Dammit! I demand more in my dystopian fiction!
Madam LibrarianPamel
This was.... an odd ride. It was completely unique and I wasn't sure where the story was going to take me but I had a fun time on the way. A pandemic rips through Australia and those effected have the ability to understand animals. People aren't sure if they're hallucinating or conversing with animals but the whole country has gone mad. People start liberating animals from zoos, sanctuaries, and farms and the whole continent is a madhouse. Jean has worked at a sanctuary for years, alternating between showing tourists the dingoes and watching her granddaughter. She's not your typical grandma though. She's an alcoholic, who loves chain smoking, and swearing. Jean gets along better with animals then she does with people (her granddaughter being the exception) and she's actually looking forward to catching this disease. She wants to talk to her dingoes. Only she has no idea what she's in for and she's in for one hell of a messed up journey. Unique and mildly terrifying - do we really want to know what the animals are saying?
