“You can’t produce the correct emotional response on demand, and other people’s interpretations of grief can sometimes be oppressive. New Animal is such a great novel about wanting to mourn in a totally unorthodox way, free from judgment, surveillance, and pressure.”
—Sally Oliver, Lit Hub
“This story is unique and compelling. New Animal is funny, sad, and illuminating about the nature of mourning. Turns out, there’s a lot to be learned about grief from the kink community. Who knew?”
—David Vogel, Buzzfeed
“Amelia is in her late 20s and working at her stepfather’s mortuary. But when her mother suddenly dies, rupturing her fragile family, Amelia flees to Tasmania, joins a BDSM community and embarks on a journey toward self-acceptance.”
—The New York Times
“A raw and irreverent portrait of one young woman’s experience of the ways in which sexuality and sorrow overlap. Baxter’s crisp, clean prose offers a surprisingly tender look at mourning from an unusual angle. A startling and intense meditation on sex, death and the uncontrollable responses a body has to both, New Animal is an arresting literary debut.”
—Alice Martin, Shelf Awareness, starred review
“Though the plot moves at a swift pace, and the BDSM arc is thoroughly entertaining, its Amelia’s meditations on grief and loss—and the anxiety that surrounds them—that make this novel sing. And it’s fascinating to watch Amelia go through the motions while attempting to reconcile what it means to be alive when everyone around you is dead…. For fans of Sally Rooney’s brand of millennial malaise and Six Feet Under’s tragicomic take on the mortuary business, New Animal is at turns graphic, raw and tender—a wholly human exploration of the Venn diagram of emotion.”
—Sarah Stiefvater, PureWow
“New Animal examines the nature of death and sex through hilarious circumstances that illuminate the grotesque human condition of being confined to a body. Baxter’s writing feels utterly original, and she has a gift for juxtaposing dark emotional interiors with unexpected situations that are laugh-out-loud funny.”
—Shelby Hinte, BOMB
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