Barn 8
An unusual eco-heist novel about two auditors for the U.S. egg industry who go rogue and plot to steal a million chickens in the middle of the night—an entire egg farm’s worth of animals.
“Barn 8 is a beautiful, urgent, politically charged book with a huge heart.”
—New York Times Book Review
“In this outrageous piece of rural noir and pitch-perfect characterization, Unferth recalls Edward Abbey’s The Monkey Wrench Gang with a dose of vegan-minded quirk..”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Aesthetically perfect and philosophically profound.”
—The Guardian
“Unferth’s lens, which telescopes through time and space, is unafraid to linger on the bizarre and vicious cycle of birth-death, need-fulfillment and supply-demand that this phantom-run barn universe perpetuates.”
—Los Angeles Times
“An incredibly nimble and frequently amusing book worthy of its deathly serious subject, one that invites the reader to think rather than merely witness.”
—The Boston Globe
“Barn 8’s chief draw and accomplishment is Unferth’s adeptness at wringing lyricism from the sordid domain of animal farming. . . . Unferth makes the unseen shit visible, and reminds her reader that however much we want to look up or look away, it is stubbornly always there, right at the end of our forks.”
—Bookforum
If this novel isn’t a movement, it has enough heart to start one.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“A daring writer of wit, imagination, and conscience, Unferth has transformed her foray into hen hell into an adroitly narrated, fast-paced, yet complexly dimensional novel about emotional and environmental devastation… [A] vividly provoking and revelatory work of ecofiction spiked with mordant humor and powered by love.”
—Booklist, starred review
“Full of grit, humour and tenderness.”
—Financial Times
“Written with vim and wit, Barn 8 is a highly enjoyable treatment of a worthwhile social issue.”
—The Observer
“Reads like a comi-tragic manifesto of our age.”
—Irish Times
“[Barn 8 is] a powerful book and a dazzling feat of imagination from one of the country’s most exciting authors.”
—Texas Observer