A recent online post recommends five speculative novels featuring talking animals and conscious creatures.
The post, published yesterday, spotlights books where animals gain human-like traits or solve mysteries. It opens with Fifteen Dogs by André Alexis, in which gods grant consciousness to dogs in Toronto. Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton follows a profane crow and a dog after a human plague. Shady Hollow by Juneau Black presents a woodland town shaken by a toad's murder, solved by a fox reporter. Aru Shah and the End of Time by Roshani Chokshi features a pigeon guide named Boo. Mort(e) by Robert Repino depicts a former house cat in an ant-led animal uprising.