Animals | Book Chatter

Strange Company
By Jean Ryan
MadeMark Publishing (March 12, 2017), 118pp.

The Short of It:

A collection of super short essays that promise to awaken your need for nature and its beauty.

The Rest of It:

Regular readers of this blog know how packed my schedule is. It’s not often that I have time to step out into nature and just observe the beauty around me but oh, how I crave it. Strange Company allowed me to do that if only for a short while.

Strange Company is a collection of nature essays about all sorts of things. Do animals feel compassion? Do they think as humans do? If the act of bleeding out a rare Horseshoe crab for the sake of science isn’t damaging to the creature itself, does it make it right to keep doing it? What about pesticides? Do you ever think about the impact that they might have on say… a bird’s food supply?

On a personal note, I absolutely believe that animals feel compassion. Every pet I’ve ever had has connected with me in some way. After the death of my mother, my dog would not leave my side. Years ago when I was diagnosed with Lupus and seriously questioned if I could survive it, my cat was right there, as I spent days in bed trying to work up enough energy just to go to work. So it’s no surprise to me that domesticated animals or even those in the wild can feel compassion. Just look into their eyes!

What I loved about this collection is that although each essay is short, often only a few pages long, they gave me a lot to think about. There’s a little bit of science for those who like facts, but there’s also a lot of heart. Ryan is a nature lover and it shows in her writing. I’ve read and enjoyed her work before and I am happy to say I enjoyed this collection as well.

Source: Review copy provided by the author. Thank you!
Disclosure: This post contains Amazon links.

Among Animals – The Lives of Animals and Humans in Contemporary Short Fiction
By John Yunker (Editor)
(Ashland Creek Press, Paperback, 9781618220257, 232pp.)

The Short of It:

A deeply introspective look at the role of animals in society.

The Rest of It:

This is a powerful, and I’ll admit, at times, unsettling collection of short stories that center around animals and their place in society. I expected most of the stories to center around “man’s best friend” but the collection goes much deeper than that.

These stories include a man’s infatuation with a bird, a story told from a stray dog’s point of view, a woman impregnated (magically speaking) by a dolphin, a pregnant woman slowly becoming goat-like, and probably what was the most powerful story for me, one about an animal taken in as “meat” that suddenly becomes quite a bit more than that.

What I briefly mentioned above doesn’t even cover the half of it. My main reason for accepting this book for review, is that it also includes two favorites stories of mine, written by Midge Raymond (The Ecstatic Cry) and Jean Ryan (Greyhound). I was introduced to their writing through their story collections (Forgetting English and Survival Skills) some time ago and ever since, I’ve looked at short fiction in an entirely new light.

Short. Fiction. Can. Pull. You. In.

Yes. Yes, it can.

I know lots and lots of readers that shy away from short fiction. Trust me, I am a novel gal. I love to lose myself in a long novel but if you haven’t given short fiction a chance lately, you really should. Among Animals, in particular, really shook me up. I was all torn up over this one. It’s not a sad collection, but at the same time, it’s not a happy collection either. Each story seems to call the reader out, and then take you down a peg. It’s a little unnerving but at the same time, comforting. That’s a strange word to use for some of these stories but there was a solemnity to it all that made me revere the collection all the more.

As you can see below, the Otter Pup approved of it and how ironic that she’d find kinship with a book about animals.

Among Animals and Otter Pup

If you are looking to stretch yourself a little as a reader and have been trying to work some short fiction into your reading schedule, I cannot recommend this collection highly enough. It’s thought-provoking, somber but also totally in your face. I loved it.

Source: Sent to me by the publisher.
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

Chatting with friends about books and life…