Den is one of those books that’s difficult to neatly describe... and I think that’s part of its appeal.

Told partly through the perspective of a fox watching a family from their garden, this is a strange, unsettling and surprisingly moving story about family, grief, fear and the idea of home. I found myself thinking of Orwell’s Animal Farm while reading, particularly in the way the animal perspective becomes a vehicle for exploring very human behaviour and choices.

The pace is measured rather than fast, but there’s an increasing sense that something isn’t quite right. It has the quality of a fever dream... familiar enough to draw you in, but increasingly strange and disorientating as the story unfolds. And beneath the unusual premise is something much more emotional: questions about the choices we make, the mistakes we carry, and whether, given the chance to go back, we would really do things differently.

It’s certainly a book that will linger. There’s something quietly haunting about it that stayed with me after I finished the final page.

I can genuinely see myself picking up a physical copy when it’s published and rereading it. I have a feeling this is one of those books where a second reading might reveal a whole different layer.

Thank you to Joe Evans, NetGalley and Headline Publishing for the advanced copy.

The only thing I knew about this book was “a fox wants to take over a man’s life and live in his place”. This is more than enough to make you interested if you love a bit of magical realism. In here everything is metaphorical and psychological; this is mostly an exploration of grief and what it’s like to be given up on the world and yourself. I don’t want to get into spoilers, so I’ll just say that reading this was sinister and thrilling. It’s hard to explain the emotional void this put me through. It read like a fairytale, then like a fever dream scenario. I was speculating about the world and the reality this is taking place in but by the end it left me so emotional, made me cry and turned me inside out, that I understood it in a deep level that it’s unexplainable simply by words. Read this book when it comes out, it’s very original and human, it is an experience I rarely get but crave for every time I pick up a book. Simply phenomenal.
Thank you to NetGalley and Headline | Wildfire for providing me with the ARC.

Den by Joe Evans is the story of a fox, a fox watching a family and desiring their home as his own, it is the story of a family, and their imperfections, and a collision course is set. Den feels like a literary novel imbued with the narrative thrust of a thriller. I wolfed it down in one sitting (apologies for the wrong animal synonym, but I don't think hungry like a fox is a thing!). It is it's own strange beast, engaging, entertaining and extremely well crafted. I won't talk about its plot - discover that yourself - but just know that this is a fabulous novel that I expect to see on some best of lists following it's publication.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC.