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kelly_e's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Title: Unlikely Animals
Author: Annie Hartnett
Genre: Magical Realism
Rating: 5.00
Pub Date: April 12, 2022
T H R E E • W O R D S
Empathetic • Joyful • Quirky
📖 S Y N O P S I S
It was a source of entertainment at Maple Street Cemetery. Both funny and sad, the kind of story we like best.
Natural-born healer Emma Starling once had big plans for her life, but she’s lost her way. A medical school dropout, she’s come back to small-town Everton, New Hampshire, to care for her father, who is dying from a mysterious brain disease. Clive Starling has been hallucinating small animals, as well as having visions of the ghost of a long-dead naturalist, Ernest Harold Baynes, once known for letting wild animals live in his house. This ghost has been giving Clive some ideas on how to spend his final days.
Emma arrives home knowing she must face her dad’s illness, her mom’s judgment, and her younger brother’s recent stint in rehab, but she’s unprepared to find that her former best friend from high school is missing, with no one bothering to look for her. The police say they don’t spend much time looking for drug addicts. Emma’s dad is the only one convinced the young woman might still be alive, and Emma is hopeful he could be right. Someone should look for her, at least. Emma isn’t really trying to be a hero, but somehow she and her father bring about just the kind of miracle the town needs.
💭 T H O U G H T S
Unlikely Animals came onto my radar after it was recommended to me by a friend who has a good sense of novels I will appreciate. The cover is appealing, yet it is so many of my buzzwords being included in the synopsis that convinced me to move this one to the top of my TBR. It was one of those books that came to be a just the right time.
Told through the POVs of the residents of Maple Street Cemetery, this novel explores aging, illness, memory loss, caregiving, familial expectations, imperfect friendships, grief and loss, addiction and the opioid crisis, kidnapping, and infidelity. Despite the heaviness of the topics covered, there are glimmers of hope and joy. The way Annie Hartnett handles and shines a light on the very real opioid crisis is heartbreaking and enlightening.
All in all, it is the cast of unforgettable and flawed characters - human, animal and spirit alike - that bring this story to life. It is an ode to both the living and the dead. Nature itself, including the miracles it brings, become its very own character, which I loved so much. The folks at the cemetery were a real hoot. Even with some characters being dead, there is so much humanity within the pages.
Unlikely Animals is unlike anything I have read before, in such a positive way. It really is the perfect combination of elements I love coming together in an uplifting and hopeful way. Annie Harnett takes very real, very serious, very tragic content and puts a comic spin on it in a way that works. A book I can see myself re-reading in the future and one that will most definitely be finding its way onto my end-of-year favoutires list. Highly recommend!
📚 R E A D • I F • Y O U • L I K E
• the natural world
• magical realism
• Remarkably Bright Creatures
⚠️ CW: epidemic, drug use, drug abuse, addiction, overdose, mental illness, terminal illness, cancer, medical content, suicide, death, death of parent, child death, infidelity, dementia, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt, kidnapping
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"People talk a lot about first loves, or the love of your life, but people don’t say as much about the friend of your life."
"But there’s always something you miss out on, at the end."
Author: Annie Hartnett
Genre: Magical Realism
Rating: 5.00
Pub Date: April 12, 2022
T H R E E • W O R D S
Empathetic • Joyful • Quirky
📖 S Y N O P S I S
It was a source of entertainment at Maple Street Cemetery. Both funny and sad, the kind of story we like best.
Natural-born healer Emma Starling once had big plans for her life, but she’s lost her way. A medical school dropout, she’s come back to small-town Everton, New Hampshire, to care for her father, who is dying from a mysterious brain disease. Clive Starling has been hallucinating small animals, as well as having visions of the ghost of a long-dead naturalist, Ernest Harold Baynes, once known for letting wild animals live in his house. This ghost has been giving Clive some ideas on how to spend his final days.
Emma arrives home knowing she must face her dad’s illness, her mom’s judgment, and her younger brother’s recent stint in rehab, but she’s unprepared to find that her former best friend from high school is missing, with no one bothering to look for her. The police say they don’t spend much time looking for drug addicts. Emma’s dad is the only one convinced the young woman might still be alive, and Emma is hopeful he could be right. Someone should look for her, at least. Emma isn’t really trying to be a hero, but somehow she and her father bring about just the kind of miracle the town needs.
💭 T H O U G H T S
Unlikely Animals came onto my radar after it was recommended to me by a friend who has a good sense of novels I will appreciate. The cover is appealing, yet it is so many of my buzzwords being included in the synopsis that convinced me to move this one to the top of my TBR. It was one of those books that came to be a just the right time.
Told through the POVs of the residents of Maple Street Cemetery, this novel explores aging, illness, memory loss, caregiving, familial expectations, imperfect friendships, grief and loss, addiction and the opioid crisis, kidnapping, and infidelity. Despite the heaviness of the topics covered, there are glimmers of hope and joy. The way Annie Hartnett handles and shines a light on the very real opioid crisis is heartbreaking and enlightening.
All in all, it is the cast of unforgettable and flawed characters - human, animal and spirit alike - that bring this story to life. It is an ode to both the living and the dead. Nature itself, including the miracles it brings, become its very own character, which I loved so much. The folks at the cemetery were a real hoot. Even with some characters being dead, there is so much humanity within the pages.
Unlikely Animals is unlike anything I have read before, in such a positive way. It really is the perfect combination of elements I love coming together in an uplifting and hopeful way. Annie Harnett takes very real, very serious, very tragic content and puts a comic spin on it in a way that works. A book I can see myself re-reading in the future and one that will most definitely be finding its way onto my end-of-year favoutires list. Highly recommend!
📚 R E A D • I F • Y O U • L I K E
• the natural world
• magical realism
• Remarkably Bright Creatures
⚠️ CW: epidemic, drug use, drug abuse, addiction, overdose, mental illness, terminal illness, cancer, medical content, suicide, death, death of parent, child death, infidelity, dementia, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt, kidnapping
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"People talk a lot about first loves, or the love of your life, but people don’t say as much about the friend of your life."
"But there’s always something you miss out on, at the end."
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Cancer, Drug abuse, Drug use, Infidelity, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Medical content, Dementia, Kidnapping, Suicide attempt, and Pandemic/Epidemic
Minor: Child death, Death, Suicide, and Death of parent
overdoseciiku's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Loveable characters? Yes
What a lovely book. Very unexpected how much I enjoyed this
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction
Minor: Medical content
galexy_brain's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Never has a book made me cry in one paragraph and laugh in the next. Wish there was more payoff and explanation for why E.H.B. was able to/decided to haunt Cliff Starling in particular.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Terminal illness, Grief, and Death of parent
Moderate: Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Drug abuse, Drug use, Infidelity, Medical content, and Kidnapping
Minor: Animal death, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, and Injury/Injury detail
elysedc's review against another edition
funny
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent
Moderate: Addiction, Child death, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Terminal illness, Kidnapping, and Suicide attempt
Minor: Cancer, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, and Medical content
rowanhill's review against another edition
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Unlikely Animals has been popping up in my recommendations for a while now and I am so glad I finally took the plunge! This quirky book is a conceptual menagerie that will make you feel all of the emotions…ALL OF THEM. Though the characters in this story are dealing with tragedy in its many forms, their journey shows how life in all of its complexity still moves forward. It is funny, sad, clever and everything in between. This is a must read for anyone who loves literary fiction and doesn’t mind some speculative elements tossed in.
The small town of Everton, New Hampshire rarely sees miracles. That is, not until Emma Starling was born with a gift for healing. With her eyes set on becoming a doctor and a desire to leave her complicated life in New Hampshire behind, Emma left for California with no intention of coming back. But when Emma’s father, Clive, has been diagnosed with a terminal, degenerative brain disease that is causing him to hallucinate and strike up a close friendship with the ghost of naturalist Ernest Harold Baynes. Things haven’t gone so well for Emma either and what should have been a triumphant return is overshadowed by a crushing truth: the gift of healing is gone. To top it all off, Emma’s best friend from High School has gone missing. But despite all of this hardship, Emma still has the fine folk of Maple Street Cemetery cheering her on.
The story is told through a Greek chorus of ghosts residing in Maple Street Cemetery. Being omniscient of all things in Everton, the mystery that was Emma’s life in California is very quickly revealed. Usually, it would bother me how quickly the information is divulged, but there is so much more to this story that it is almost a necessity. Despite having an omniscient narrator, Hartnett has still found a way to allow the story to gradually unfold and keep the reader guessing. The gossipy ghosts also have such a charming and sincere narrative voice that it is easy to get sucked in and feel like part of their group. I could see how the narrative style could be off-putting to some readers, but I quickly grew to like it.
What really makes this a stand out novel for me was that it felt true in a way that’s hard to express. Though faced with tragedy and struggle, the characters in this novel still feel like they are really living. There are still moments of joy, triumph, and comedy even while Clive’s condition deteriorates and Emma struggles to find her place after losing something that has always defined her and made her special. The affirmation and support the ghosts give to all of these experiences is a really beautiful and masterful touch that rounds out the whole experience.
The small town of Everton, New Hampshire rarely sees miracles. That is, not until Emma Starling was born with a gift for healing. With her eyes set on becoming a doctor and a desire to leave her complicated life in New Hampshire behind, Emma left for California with no intention of coming back. But when Emma’s father, Clive, has been diagnosed with a terminal, degenerative brain disease that is causing him to hallucinate and strike up a close friendship with the ghost of naturalist Ernest Harold Baynes. Things haven’t gone so well for Emma either and what should have been a triumphant return is overshadowed by a crushing truth: the gift of healing is gone. To top it all off, Emma’s best friend from High School has gone missing. But despite all of this hardship, Emma still has the fine folk of Maple Street Cemetery cheering her on.
The story is told through a Greek chorus of ghosts residing in Maple Street Cemetery. Being omniscient of all things in Everton, the mystery that was Emma’s life in California is very quickly revealed. Usually, it would bother me how quickly the information is divulged, but there is so much more to this story that it is almost a necessity. Despite having an omniscient narrator, Hartnett has still found a way to allow the story to gradually unfold and keep the reader guessing. The gossipy ghosts also have such a charming and sincere narrative voice that it is easy to get sucked in and feel like part of their group. I could see how the narrative style could be off-putting to some readers, but I quickly grew to like it.
What really makes this a stand out novel for me was that it felt true in a way that’s hard to express. Though faced with tragedy and struggle, the characters in this novel still feel like they are really living. There are still moments of joy, triumph, and comedy even while Clive’s condition deteriorates and Emma struggles to find her place after losing something that has always defined her and made her special. The affirmation and support the ghosts give to all of these experiences is a really beautiful and masterful touch that rounds out the whole experience.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness, Mental illness, and Dysphoria
Moderate: Addiction, Death, Drug abuse, Terminal illness, Grief, and Death of parent
Minor: Child death, Toxic relationship, Medical content, and Kidnapping
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