Animal Person

Book excerpt: The highly anticipated follow-up to Alexander MacLeod's critically acclaimed debut, Animal Person is a wry and perfectly-observed collection of short stories about intimacy, family and the struggle to connect Animal Person is a collection of startling juxtapositions. Criminals and bystanders, siblings and strangers, infants, adolescents, young parents, and the elderly, mammals, reptiles and fish: unexpected encounters occur and every meeting is an opportunity for recognition or rejection. An empty-nest couple, separated after years of coexisting, find themselves pulled into the dreams of their silent, gazing rabbit; a mysterious passenger in search of his missing suitcase roams through the caverns of a 1970s LA airport; a piano recital goes wildly astray; and a great-aunt refuses to apologise as she struggles to find a place for everything in the tight space of her senior's apartment. In the adjoining motel room, a serial killer plans his next move; and a petty argument between two sisters is interrupted by an unexpected visitor. The eight stories in Animal Person are filled with wonder and yearning as MacLeod captures the fleeting intensities that shape all of our lives. MacLeod is a master of the short story form, and this is a collection that beats with raw emotion and shimmers with the complexity of our shared human experience. 'Exquisite...expertly paced and finely observed' New York Times 'Excellent... The eight stories, composed in crystalline prose, glimmer and gleam with yearning and loss' Eithne Farry, Daily Mail 'Tender, funny and ever-surprising' Lynn Coady