THE HUMAN ZOO, now available!
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
"Smart, crisp prose distinguishes Murray's action-packed latest...This is captivating."
" Domestic drama or international crisis, or both? For families, like Christina Klein's, it is always both. The Human Zoo begins with Klein's frank, gimlet-eyed assessments of her family and friends, in a Philippines controlled by a Duterte-like president, but what emerges effortlessly out of this is a spectacle of her family of aristocrats brought low by the populists they believe they control, and a vision of the Philippines but also of America, the two countries now more alike than ever before. One of the most interesting novels I've read in years, Murray is at the height of her powers, offering us a breathtaking, funny, terrifying oracle." —ALEXANDER CHEE, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel
In the Philippines of today, as Ting finds out, it is not external influences...but rather the systems of power within the country, driven chiefly by a dictatorial leader, that dehumanize citizens...
Sabina Murray's smart, idea-packed story grapples with corruption, identity, and loyalty, building to a searing climax.
Immediately absorbing and atmospheric... Murray vaults the reader into a decadent world facing the stark reality of moral failure.
...sublimely transitions into a contemporary sociopolitical thriller enhanced with colonial legacy, cultural erasure, government corruption, and unreliable narrators – an exhilarating literary experience.
...a narrative of a woman's search for identity, a historical, cultural, and political tale of Filipino society and a tension-filled, action-packed story... an engaging, interesting, and informative novel...
Klein is a sharp, observant narrator...To a reader unfamiliar with Filipino history it feels both edifying and painfully familiar.
"The Human Zoo unfolds like the best of stories - one compelling detail following the next until an entire world emerges, full of revelations and aching truths. Murray has given us a powerful page-turner full of wry humor and shattering wisdom about love, family, the meaning of home, and history. This novel pulses with that most difficult of urgent truths: running away only leads us back to ourselves but that might be exactly what saves us in the end."—MAAZA MENGISTE, author of The Shadow King, shortlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize
"Narratively speaking, Sabina Murray is always up to something. In her new novel The Human Zoo, a harrowing tour of steamy, decadent Manila, she combines an unflinching gaze at moral complexity with humor so dark it will make you anxious about yourself for appreciating it. Murray may well be the most fearless and gloriously subversive novelist we have." —VALERIE MARTIN, author of Property