Animal Crackers

Hannah Tinti

Chapters (23)

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published in the United States by The Dial Press, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

THE DIAL PRESS and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Originally published in hardcover in the United States by The Dial Press, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, in 2004.

The following stories appeared in different form in the following publications:

“Animal Crackers” in Alaska Quarterly Review, “Home Sweet Home” in Epoch and Best American Mystery Stories 2003, “Reasonable Terms” in Story, “Slim’s Last Ride” in Sonora Review, “Hit Man of the Year” in Story, “Gallus, Gallus” in Story Quarterly, “How to Revitalize the Snake in Your Life” in Another Magazine.

This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley by Hannah Tinti. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

ISBN 978-0-385-33744-1
Ebook ISBN 978-0-307-42278-1

randomhousebooks.com

Book design by Helene Berinsky, adapted for ebook

Cover design: Belina Huey
Cover photograph: Tatsuya Sato

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Praise

Praise for Hannah Tinti’s

animal crackers

“The animals of Tinti’s imagination are not merely symbols but phantoms. They stalk the shadows of her characters’ worlds, conveying what it feels like to have your heart broken.”

—Cleveland Plain Dealer

“[These] vignettes show off Tinti’s gift for the quick study. They also establish her theme of animals as the secret sharers of humanity, the unwitting repositories of our desires and fears.”

—New York Times Book Review

“Hannah Tinti is not just a masterly writer—though her wondrous debut certainly proves her to be that. No, what really floors you is the span, the variegation of her gifts. This book reads like a first-class greatest-hits compilation, the work of many distinct, enviable virtuosi. Animal Crackers ushers in the arrival of a giant.”

—Darin Strauss, author of Chang and Eng and The Real McCoy

“Tinti’s suburban gothic recalls Joy Williams. . . . A redeeming generosity underlies the harsher realities in these stories, and it is to Tinti’s credit that her zookeepers and pet owners, as flawed as they are, are as sympathetic as her wise giraffes and gentle bunnies.”

— Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Hilarious . . . luminous . . . whimsical . . . an enjoyable set from a writer on the move.”

—People