Animals is the Jerwood Fiction Uncovered award winning novel from British author and journalist Emma Jane Unsworth.


Laura and Tyler have been best friends for years. More than best friends, they live together, eat together and more than often pass out drunk together. Their twenties are gone and as their thirties start to crawl by, expectations mount up.


Laura’s engaged to a piano player but with his recent decision to quit drinking, she’s felt things have been strained. Instead of a careless passion they could share, alcohol was turning into a wedge between them. But why should she give up something she enjoys, especially with Tyler, just because he decided to? Everyone’s pushing her to grow up. Real jobs, marriage, kids, who needs it?


Animals is a breath of literary fresh air in a book world filled with women’s fiction that I find myself completely unable to relate to. I should probably point out at this point that I’m not a pill popping alcoholic but Laura and Tyler are as confused by being in their early thirties as myself. You’re constantly forced into thinking about children and weddings and making massive ‘life choices’ while people use terms like ‘ticking clock’ and the press insist if you’re not wed and bred by 35 you might as well end it all because your life is over anyway.


Sharp, funny and touching this unflinching tale of friendship between two women trying to find their place in the world is a modern classic in the making.






Buy your copy of Animals from Amazon here.