Dogs of the Deadlands: Shortlisted for the Week Junior Book Awards

‘This book! It broke my heart and then splinted it back together again. Full of hope and love and wildness... Imagine Watership Down meets The Animals of Farthing Wood but fiercer.’
Hannah Gold, author of The Last Bear

Chernobyl, 1986. Without humans, how will dogs survive?

As humans fled the nuclear disaster, they were forced to leave their pets behind. Without people, nature began to return to the woods surrounding the power plant—lynx, bear, and wolves. But the overgrown forest is no place for dogs. Can Zoya, and her pups Misha and Luka, learn to survive in the deadlands? And will Zoya ever find her way home to her beloved owner?

Praise for Anthony McGowan:

‘McGowan's prose is beautiful in its brevity and devastating in its emotional impact.’ Bookseller

‘The Carnegie medal winner McGowan is superb at stories about children who do not have all the advantages.’ The Sunday Times

Anthony McGowan is one of the most widely acclaimed young adult and children’s authors in the UK. His books have won numerous major awards. In 2020, he was awarded the CILIP Carnegie Medal for Lark. He was also shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal with Rook and won the Booktrust Teenage Prize and the Catalyst Award for Henry Tumour. His YA novel The Knife That Killed Me was made into a critically-lauded film in 2014. Anthony lives in London, with his wife, two children and dog.