If you have not read this book or even heard of it, or you might not think it would be your cup of proverbial tea, do not be deterred by the cartoonesque art style and the anthropomorphic animals! This is a very gritty and brutal crime drama.
It is very easy to be seduced by a book that is touted as a cross between “Chinatown” and “Animal Farm”
It all starts with a film. Not just a normal film, but in Prey industry, they call “Hunt Porn” Local Serengeti City Private Investigator, whose also giraffe and answers to the name Immanuel Diamond, but he’s “Manny” to his buddies, gets a job from his uncle Theo, a powerful local Judge to find a certain film that contains some sensitive material, that being his wife in pretend scenario where she is acting like she’s being eaten by a predator. Theo paid to make the whole mess go away, but like most secrets, they always come up for air eventually.
This chain-smoking crass giraffe glides thru the slums and gutters of the depraved as well as the palaces of the rich hippo crime bosses trying to track down the film that his uncle is obsessed with finding out things prove to be a way simpler and at the same time complicated to his case.
Izar Lunacek pulls double duty on this book, as a co-writer (with Nejc Juren) and the artist too. His art is a bit of an acquired taste, but once you get used to it, it’s actually pretty interesting, the way he portrays scale of emotion: the seething intensity of hatred and anger, to joy and sadness. This book is morally loose, (like our world) but also shows you a lens into which you see the world around you, a world fraught with racism, classism, and hypocrisy, but since this world is populated by talking animals, the message is easier to sneak past your defenses and go straight for the throat at times you would least expect it. The Slovenian writer/artist who got his start in a local newspaper should be someone to keep an eye out for in the future.
Dense and unapologetic, Animal Noir is devious, very allegorical, scandalous and really creeps into the back of your mind for hours later. It seeps into it with ease, like water into a sponge and saturates your brain. Do yourself a favor and get this one.