Animal Tales: Novels old and new that every animal lover should read

From the snake tempting Adam and Eve to the sheep that saved Odysseus from the Cyclops, animals have featured prominently in literature from the very beginning of literature. 

Today, animals play leading roles in many bestselling novels, from the dog Almondine in The Story of Edgar Sawtelle to Marcellus, the Pacific octopus in Remarkably Bright Creatures.

In a perfect world, and especially in a time when we are losing thousands of species every year, every animal would have a moment in the literary spotlight, so we could learn more about them, get to know their talents and troubles, and perhaps save them while we still can. 

Of course, with an estimated 2 million animal species on the planet, not every species will get its time in the spotlight — but we can try. And there’s certainly no limit when it comes to genre. While the contemporary novels in the list below all fall into the literary category, I’ve co-authored a mystery novel, Devils Island, featuring endangered Tasmanian devils — because why can’t we help protect a species with a good beach read?

While most novels are primarily human focused, animal lovers can enjoy a wide range of species featured in novels old and new. In honor of World Animal Day, I’ve gathered together a list of 8 novels, classic and contemporary, that will entertain — and enlighten — any reader wanting to learn more about our greater-than-human neighbors.


CLASSICS


Moby-Dick; or, The Whale

Inspired by the true story of a sperm whale that sunk the whaling ship Essex, Herman Melville, who once sailed on a whaling vessel himself, penned an epic novel about obsession, race, class, culture, and the over-extraction of our oceans (a theme as prescient then as it is pressing now). Countless readers have begun this 209,000-word doorstop only to give up halfway through. And there are indeed many chapter-length asides and diversions that may try your patience. But stick with it until the end, and this novel will stick with you.

Gutenberg (free)

Black Beauty: His Grooms and Companions, the Autobiography of a Horse

In 1877, Anna Sewell was ill and bed-ridden when she wrote a novel that would become a bestseller in England. It was later stolen by George Angell, founder of the Massachusetts SPCA, who published it in the US. By pricing the book at just 20 cents a copy, he created a bestseller — selling nearly 400,000 copies in its first year. Sadly, Sewell never lived to see her novel become so successful. Written from the horse’s perspective, Black Beauty awakened readers in a highly personal and painful way to plight of working animals who find themselves at the mercy of their abusive owners. In many ways this book helped give rise to the modern animal rights movement.

Gutenberg (free)

White Fang

A half-wolf, half-dog grows up rightfully suspicious of humans in this novel by Jack London. Writing about how White Fang viewed humans: “He was suspicious of them. It was true that they sometimes gave meat, but more often they gave hurt. Hands were things to keep away from. They hurled stones, wielded sticks and clubs and whips, administered slaps and clouts, and, when they touched him, were cunning to hurt with pinch and twist and wrench.” But there are better humans to come and a better ending for White Fang.

Gutenberg (free)

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH

In 1970, Robert C. O’Brien wrote a children’s book about a group of rats that had escaped from the laboratories of the National Institute for Mental Health (NIMH). The rats had built a city beneath the earth that rivaled any human city — with electricity and elevators. And these rats would come to rescue Mrs. Frisby and her young family just as they were about to lose their home to a farmer’s plow. As a child, I was thrilled to discover this fantasy world, and it did not seem far-fetched to picture rats who could talk and create cities beneath the soil. The fact is, science knows very little about animal intelligence, and each year we learn more. We now know that rats laugh and, as in the book, will readily risk their lives to protect others. Perhaps one day we will learn that the rats of NIHM were not so unusually intelligent after all and that all rats are far smarter than we give them credit for.

Bookshop / Amazon


CONTEMPORARY


Barn 8

Deb Olin Unferth has written a novel about two people who set out to liberate an egg farm’s population of chickens, yet this novel is so much more than that. We learn chicken history, emotion, language; Unferth writes: “In the wild, chickens have complicated cliques and distinct voices. They talk among themselves, even before they hatch. A hen twitters and sings to her eggs and the chicks inside answer, peeping and burbling and clicking through the shells. Adult chickens have over thirty categories of conversation … Chickens gossip, summon, play, flirt, teach, warn, mourn, fight, praise, and promise.” 

Review by Midge Raymond

Bookshop / Amazon

Love and Ordinary Creatures

Author Gwyn Human Rubio has created a tender and heartbreaking love story between a sulfur-crested cockatoo and his human caretaker. Snatched in a net from his Australian homeland as a young parrot, Caruso has come to terms with captivity and has learned all he knows of love from his previous owner, who was obsessively fixated on his childhood sweetheart. Now in his new home with the beautiful Clarissa, Caruso has found both love and happiness — until a handsome stranger arrives in town and sets his sights on Clarissa. Smart, passionate, and wildly inventive, Caruso — a clever, conniving, sympathetic and very lovable narrator — strives to put his human rival in his place before he loses Clarissa for good.  

Bookshop / Amazon

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

What if your sister was taken away from you when you were both children? And your parents pretended it never happened? Without giving away any spoilers, this powerful novel by Karen Joy Fowler blurs the lines between human and non-human, between family and stranger, between animal rights activism and justice. 

Review by Shel Graves

Bookshop / Amazon

Open Throat

Inspired by the mountain lion, named P-22, who lived in the hills of Griffith Park in Los Angeles, Henry Hoke takes us inside the mind of this lonely animal (whose pronouns are they/them) as they search for food, love and a bit of peace amidst the people and cars. The real P-22, sadly is no longer with us, having suffered from a car injury, but this imagining of the life of an urban mountain lion is a story everyone in an urban wildlife interface should know. 

Review by Midge Raymond

Bookshop / Amazon


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