‘Wild Animal’ by Joël Dicker

Published by MacLehose Press,
25 October 2025.
ISBN: 978-1-52944-781-1 (HB)

It is difficult to write about ‘Wild Animals’ without giving the game away, but I shall do my best. This problem is caused by an extraordinary conglomeration of twists and turns in which nothing and nobody is what they seem. Reader, beware!

The story revolves around a robbery which we know will take place on a certain day. Indeed, we are given the details at the very start (I refer you to my first paragraph). Almost immediately we are introduced to a husband and wife who live in a modern house, ‘an oasis, a small, secret paradise tucked away from the curious, and only accessible by a private road. The occupants themselves were cut from the same exquisite cloth: Arpad and Sophie Braun were the ideal couple and the perfect parents of two beautiful children.’ (I refer you etc etc, and shan’t bother mentioning this again!). 

The Brauns are friends with the Liégeans, Greg and Karine, as a result of their sons being in the same football team. Greg is in the police and a member of the SWAT team. He has developed an obsession with Sophie Braun to the extent of taking his dog for walks through the woods between his house and hers so that he can spy on her. His voyeurism later goes to greater and potentially career-ending extremes. Partly because of that and his job he ends in a couple of awkward situations. 

Arpad works in finance; Sophie is a lawyer. Both have a backstory in St Tropez where Sophie’s parents live. Her father, a restaurateur, is an interesting character who has more money to dispose of than is good for him. Much is made of a robbery some years previously in Menton. We are told at one point by one of her friends that Sophie ‘was a chameleon’, at another ‘but, of course, she was lying’. This comes as a result of the introduction of the Beast, an old flame of Sophie’s who is also known to Arpad in another context. Sophie welcomes his reappearance rather more than Arpad. To say that pasts come back to haunt people is a considerable understatement. Both Sophie and the Beast have tattoos of a panther. Matters become increasingly messy as the days before the robbery are counted off. 

This is an intricately-plotted, complex and fast moving novel. There are constant flashbacks, with affairs, dishonesty and deception the names of the game. Only one of the main characters comes out of the story with any credit, and I shall leave you to discover who that is. It is an engrossing read in a vivid translation by Robert Bononno, and one I thoroughly recommend. A couple of questions to ponder when you get to the end of it: who said that crime doesn’t pay, and is the conclusion fair on the one character who ends up in the worst position of anybody?
-------
Reviewer: David Whittle 

Joël Dicker was born in Geneva in 1985, where he studied Law. His first Book The Truth About The Harry Quebert Affair was nominated for the Prix Goncourt and won the Grand Prix du Roman de l'Académie Française and the Prix Goncourt des Lycéens. It soon became a worldwide success publishing in 45 countries and selling more than 3.5 million copies. In the UK it was a Times number one bestseller and was chosen for the Richard and Judy Book Club as well as Simon Mayo's Radio 2 Book Club. 

David Whittle is firstly a musician (he is an organist and was Director of Music at Leicester Grammar School for over 30 years) but has always enjoyed crime fiction. This led him to write a biography of the composer Bruce Montgomery who is better known to lovers of crime fiction as Edmund Crispin, about whom he gives talks now and then.