"Filthy Animals" by Brandon Taylor - review

 “Filthy Animals” by Brandon Taylor:

This collection of loosely linked short stories highlights momentary dramas of loosely connected young people. 

As in Normal People by Sally Rooney, these members of the younger/youngest generation act and live, connect and disconnect with a frightening speed under rules both bafflling and eluding immediate understanding. Maybe there are no rules at all. The lives of these people unfold for a short moment in sometimes banal, sometimes harsh and unforgiving, unsentimental or frightening ways and show them at their most vulnerable.

Underlying all these stories and glimpses of lives is a melancholy that stretches far beyond the normal lost feeling of coming-of-age. It is a melancholy that comes from being lonely. All these people are lonely, even in closest contact to each other or being in company. There is sadness and much suffering in this book, more mental than physical. Sometimes it seems that your worst enemy is the one that you love the most. Everyone seems under attack or is forced to be prepared to defend himself against attacks that will undoubtedly come. Throughout the book there is loneliness, alienation or hurtful, unsparing introspection. Many of the people we meet are queer or caught in a moment where they have to decide if the line between straight and gay should be crossed. 

These emotionally rich stories often concern the body, predominantly male but not always, and many pair vulnerability with brutality. What we learn from them is that vulnerability is part of life and only through it we might come to learn to connect and accept. 

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