They are transmitted to us with a light touch and no trace of sentimentality.' J.M. This book feels like a major mind announcing itself.' Anna Funder 'The life stories related by these very civilized animals are in some cases touching (the elephant), in others amusing (the mussel), but all are absorbing. Dovey's exquisitely drawn creatures grapple nobly with their animal natures, a genius point of view from which to illuminate how we humans - ostensibly conscious and verbal - are trapped in ours. It has elements of strangeness and greatness, like Kafka. 2015) Reviewed by Dustin Illingworth It is a lovely irony that even a cursory glance at the history of literature illuminates how profoundly seductive, even essential, animality has been in this attempt to clarify the human condition. 'Only the Animalsis mesmerizing and exhilarating, funny and moving. Only the Animals by Ceridwen Dovey (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Sep. An animal's-eye view of humans at our brutal worst and our creative best, Only the Animalsasks us to believe again in the redemptive power of reading and writing fiction. And a dolphin sent to Iraq by the US Navy writes a letter to Sylvia Plath. In the siege of Sarajevo a bear starving to death tells a fairytale. A Russian tortoise once owned by the Tolstoys drifts in space during the Cold War. In Nazi Germany a dog seeks enlightenment.

In a trench on the Western Front a cat recalls her owner Colette's theatrical antics in Paris. The souls of ten animals caught up in human conflicts over the last century tell their astonishing stories of life and death. 'The most original, surprising and inspired book I read this year.' Stephen Romei, Weekend Australian Perhaps only the animals can tell us what it is to be human. Exquisitely written, playful and poignant, Only the Animalsis a remarkable literary achievement by the award-winning Ceridwen Dovey, one of our brightest young writers.