AustLit

'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.

'Then one day, disturbing news arrives of a pandemic sweeping the country. 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. But as the flu progresses, the unstoppable voices become overwhelming, and many people begin to lose their minds.

'When Jean’s infected son, Lee, 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 it means to be human — and what would happen, for better or worse, if we finally understood what animals were saying.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Beyond the killing fields and the temples of Angkor Wat is Cambodia: a country with a genocidal past and a wide, open smile. A frontier land where anything is possible - at least for Western expatriates. In these loosely linked stories, Laura Jean McKay takes us deep into this complex country, exploring the uneasy spaces where local and foreign lives meet.Three backpackers board a train, ignoring the danger signs - and find themselves used as bargaining chips in a terrible game.A jaded expat, tired of real girls, falls in love with an ancient statue.As they explore the sweltering streets of Phnom Penh, two Australian tourists come face to face with the cracks in their marriage.There are devastating re-imaginings of the country's troubled history, as well as tender, funny moments of tentative understanding. These are bold and haunting stories, deftly told.' (Publisher's blurb)