The Animals: A Novel
Christian Kiefer
Language: English
Pages: 320
ISBN: 087140883X
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
For fans of Denis Johnson and Peter Matthiessen, a literary thriller from one of the most exciting new voices in American fiction.
Bill Reed manages a wildlife sanctuary in rural Idaho, caring for injured animals―raptors, a wolf, and his beloved bear, Majer, among them―that are unable to survive in the wild. Seemingly rid of his troubled past, Bill hopes to marry the local veterinarian and live a quiet life together, the promise of which is threatened when a childhood friend is released from prison. Suddenly forced to confront the secrets of his criminal youth, Bill battles fiercely to preserve the shelter that protects these wounded animals and to keep hidden his turbulent, even dangerous, history. Alternating between past and present, Christian Kiefer contrasts the wreckage of Bill’s crime-ridden years in Reno, Nevada, with the elusive promise of a peaceful future. In finely sculpted prose imaginatively at odds with the harsh, volatile world Kiefer evokes, The Animals builds powerfully toward the revelation of Bill’s defining betrayal―and the drastic lengths Bill goes to in order to escape the consequences.
calling me a bitch? Is that what I heard? The orange-haired woman was saying something from behind the counter now, calling to Rick first and then to the thin man, who still did not look up from his plate. Nat did not move from his seat, did not even set down his fork, instead seemed frozen there, watching them, the man’s burger descending so slowly that it seemed to float at the nether end of an arm that appeared to be constructed entirely of coiled brown rope and smeared tattoos. On his
What is it? Bill stood and went to where his coat hung on a hook by the door and from its pocket brought forth a clear plastic ziplock baggie containing the tattered and worn paperback, its pages held together by a rubber band. I told you I thought I had a book on desert animals, he said, and I found it. He returned to the couch and handed it to the boy. Wildlife of the Intermountain West. The pronghorn antelope stood looking back at him from the cover without expression. Cool, Jude said. He
came up here to begin with. To get away from all those drunks down in Winnemucca. Shit, your dad. Your brother. That would’ve been me too. So I got the hell out of there. But I’m up here and I’m still fucking up. You’re not listening. I haven’t had a drink since I was twenty-seven years old. You make a decision and fight hard to keep it that way. It’s not a decision. Everything’s a decision, your uncle tells you. Every goddamned thing. But in that moment you do not think your uncle knows what
few months they were dating regularly and she introduced him to Jude, four years old at the time. Grace told Bill that the boy’s father was essentially gone from their lives, living in Spokane, a man who had had repeated affairs and essentially abandoned all interest in Jude once she divorced him and moved to Idaho. I don’t know what to say about that, Bill told her. Just don’t ever cheat on me and we’ll be fine. Deal, he said. He had felt lucky. That was the word for it. As if something had
This time he could see Rick once again, his figure limping and struggling through the snow, not away from him but toward, some fetch or wraith or grim doppelgänger come to end him, and the fear that clutched at his heart held him there, watching in terror for a long, trembling moment until, at last, he turned and began an erratic, panicked stumble uphill, each step postholing up to his thighs, his feet numb but his body pressing forward in desperation. He could not remember how many shells