The Animals in That Country
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Narrated by:
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Laura Jean McKay
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By:
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Laura Jean McKay
About this listen
Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke award.
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.
©2020 Laura Jean McKay (P)2020 W. F. Howes LtdCritic reviews
"A game-changing, life-changing novel." (Ceridwen Dovey)
"Deliriously strange, blackly hilarious, and completely exhilarating." (James Bradley)
"Engrossing, subversive and surprisingly profound." (J.P. Pomare)
What listeners say about The Animals in That Country
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Anonymous User
- 16-10-21
unsentimental but moving
people who prefer sympathetic characters, and mean by that nice, or admirable ones might struggle. But if by sympathetic you mean you can emphasise with them, understand them, and by doing so come to care for them more than you'd initially thought, the central character of this book IS sympathetic. Or I'm too cynical about myself to do otherwise.
the narration is better than it seemed at first, especially the speech of animals. at times it felt slightly stilted, but over time it came to work as a middle ground between the performance inherent in a lot of narrations, and simply a sound rendition of the words on the page. I think it's narrated by the author which is excellent because it means this is how the author envisioned the animals speech. and their speech is really the best part of it.
the story, as my heading says, is unsentimental but moving. It raises the question, if we could hear animals speak, would it turn us into vegans, or wholesale animal killers? The implicit answer here is fairly pessimistic.
if you're not the kind of person who uses 'does the dog die' for that exact question look away now. if you are: a dog does, it's upsetting but brief. But the one you'll start wondering/worrying about from the early chapters: no.
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- Anonymous User
- 09-05-22
Amazing
Brilliant. Amazing story, superb narration. Can't wait to read more of her work. .
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- Anonymous User
- 07-01-22
Entertaining eye opening and painful
An unusual first person narrative, a bush granny with boots as big as her mouth into which any intoxicant is poured, so her actions lose their bearings, over and over on her cackhanded journey to be with her kin, as the world becomes both easier and far harder to understand.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 14-10-21
Raw and original
I really like the theme. It's something I've not encountered before and certainly the raw dialogue helps a lot bring authenticity to the story.
I don't want to add anything to the summary. But I will describe the book as brutal, raw, animalistic, increasingly depressing, but also, quite importantly too, original.
My only caution to readers is that for an audiobook you need to stop and focus on the story. This isn't a book I'd recommend to listen to while doing chores.
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- Anonymous User
- 03-10-21
awsomely strange and gripping
loved this thought provoking book . found myself fully immersed in this wonderful book
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- Anonymous User
- 01-06-23
Something a bit different
I heard this book reviewed on Radio 4 so I decided to buy it, despite the mixed reviews. I enjoyed it as it is different. It explores what might happen if animals/humans could communicate, but that’s where the similarity between Dr.Doolittle ends. However I wasn’t totally engrossed and had to go back a few times. If you don’t like bad language don’t listen, but if you don’t mind if it is in context and fits the character, read on. The writer/narrator is Australian, I felt this was right for the book. It has an inconclusive ending which I found sad, but all in all, a good listen.
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- Anonymous User
- 24-10-21
Really interesting concept
Really interesting concept, in all the speculative fiction I've read not something I've come across before. This is a genre I love, one of the reasons I love it is because a small change in the status qi can reveal so much about society and people. This book does this really well.
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- Anonymous User
- 02-03-22
A strange, stilted story
I found the premise fascinating, especially given the current global pandemic - what if a disease could make you understand what animals, birds and insects are saying? The characters are interesting, raw and realistic. However, I did find that the plot dragged, and it took me a long time to finish listening to the book. The performance was oddly stilted which somehow suited the animal voices, the confusion, the drink and disease, but made it a hard listen.
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- Anonymous User
- 07-10-23
Terrible in so many ways
The narration, the characters, the story. We read this book for our book club and it was agreed it was one of the worst yet
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- Anonymous User
- 05-12-21
A struggle
Overall, one of the most boring books I've listened to. It just wasn't very interesting or engaging and seemed to be going nowhere fast. I did eventually finish it, more out of a sense of duty than desire!
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