Fans pick 85 books like Ka

I underestimated fish for a long time. I’ve been amazed by recent evidence that some of them will seemingly recognize themselves in mirrors, make logical inferences, or hunt in teams with octopuses.

I found Balcombe’s book an absorbing tour through this new picture of fish: creatures equipped with minds that help them solve the challenges of their underwater worlds.

In some ways, this book is the “reality check” that I needed after reading Born Free.

Ceiridwen Terrill tells the story of why she decided to raise a wolf-dog hybrid—and why the experience was ultimately a tragedy for both Terrill and Inyo, her pet.

Writing about the experience was extremely brave, especially because it ended so sadly—but Terrill’s candor and vulnerability as she explains why she made the choices she did completely gripped me, and her writing is so vivid, I felt like I was right there with Inyo, struggling to fit in as an animal who was neither a cuddly domestic dog nor a self-sufficient wild animal. 

Technically, Brooke Bolander's The Only Harmless Great Thing is a novella and not a novel.

But this story, set in an alternate universe in which hyperintelligent elephants are forced into toxic factory work, packs so much pathos, vivid description, and (especially!) the world-building around elephant culture—I swoon over the voice in which the elephants tell their stories and myths to the reader—it may as well be three times as long.

This is the most modern book on my list, and it did get some excellent critical attention, including the 2018 Nebula Award for Best Novelette. But Bolander's voice of the elephants alone (to say nothing of the other voices, each masterfully different) is so danged magnificent, the more people know of this work, the better.

Zucchini the ferret, born in the Bronx Zoo, leads a bleak life.

When he learns about the outside world, he yearns to escape—but when he does, it's straight into chaos.

I read Zucchini many times as a child and last read it in my 30s, and it's wonderfully more grimdark than I remember. Published in 1982, the book is 1980's-New-York gritty, and so are the hard adult lessons: fighting for your needs is full of risk; betrayal is common; love, compassion, and understanding are scarce; and idealism has an unsustainable cost.

But this makes the bits of joy that Zucchini wrests from the world all the more vivid. The story, like the world, is hard; but the story, like the world, has hope.

In Paul Galico's The Abandoned (copyright 1950), 8-year-old Peter is transformed into a kitten after a mysterious accident, befriends an older stray, and learns how to behave as a cat as he teaches his new friend about the occasional goodness in people.

I grew up with cats and was obsessed with all things feline, and I couldn't resist this story, in its charmingly British voice, that explained to the reader how to properly behave as one; nor, I imagine, could many other younger cat lovers if they knew about this book.

(Because it if happened to Peter, maybe it could happen to us, and we ought to read this how-to, to be prepared. You know… just in case.) 

Tom Shachtman's Beachmaster, in which the sea lion Daniel Au Fond becomes obsessed with deciphering the fragments of an ancient legend—or is it a key but semi-forgotten piece of sea lion oral history?—hit my young world in the midst of my own obsession with "The Cryptic Prophecy" fantasy trope.

Marine mammals are an uncommon choice for sentient animals in fantasy, and all this plus my own permanent obsession with exploration meant that the vast, literally ocean-crossing scale of this story, with its multiple and differing sentient animal cultures, made it irresistible.

Luckily for me, Beachmaster is actually the first book of a trilogy (followed by Wavebender and Driftwhistler), so this was only the beginning. (Consider this paragraph a vote for all 3.)

This book tells the true story of an African couple who adopted a lion cub, raised her to adulthood, and then eventually returned her to the wild.

In my reporting on wild pets and reintroductions of captive animals, I learned that Elsa’s story was a bit of a miracle. Such successful reintroductions are very rare. The Adamsons were complex people and their story has an ambiguous legacy, especially given that it may have inspired people who were not really able to care for big cats to try to keep them as pets.

However, there’s no denying that their experience makes for a fascinating read. And by living so closely with her, they were able to see and describe Elsa as an individual, not just “a lioness” interchangeable with any other.

I was absolutely riveted by this short but powerful book chronicling the fascinating and sometimes heartbreaking history of animal escapes from zoos, circuses, and other forms of captivity. Hribal makes the case that these stories of animal “resistance” are evidence that wild animals value their autonomy and I, for one, was very much convinced. 

I loved that crows’ fascinating abilities are described in detail and woven into this mystery/thriller’s plot. Sloan’s mother is an ornithologist who studied crows and taught her children how the amazing birds form strong bonds, recognize faces, hold grudges, and mimic human voices. 

When Sloan returns to her hometown as her mother is being released from a psychiatric facility and her father from prison, she repeatedly hears a crow calling Ridge, the name of her brother who went missing years before. This eerie echo of the past drives her to learn the truth about her brother’s disappearance, even as she is sucked back up into the childhood trauma that put her parents away. PTSD, double lives, and creeping insanity make this a riveting read, enriched by the crow imagery.

I loved how crows play an important role in this Southern thriller, first as witnesses, then as historians, and finally as heroes. In 1828, crows observed a mass murder that set in motion almost two centuries of witchcraft by a coven operating under the cover of a college sorority. In the present day, the main character, Annabeth, assumes the ever-present crows at her new college hate her when, in fact, they are watching over her. Finally, crows play a major role in the climax. 

I loved the supernatural aspect of the crows, which is based in the natural world, and how this very enjoyable, eerie story wrapped in witchcraft has elements of coming of age, family trauma, and Native American mysticism.