Little Fur #2: A Fox Called Sorrow (ISBN 0375838562)

A fantasy from Australia:
Isobelle Carmody's LITTLE FUR: A FOX CALLED SORROW provides a fantasy from Australia about a half elf, half troll girl who heals animals in the heart of a major city. Her discovery that her world is threatened leads to an extraordinary journey to the heart of what she fears with a mysterious fox called Sorrow, who believes their journey is doomed to fail.

A tale seen through other creatures' eyes:
Throughout "A Fox Called Sorrow", this talented Australian writer, Isobelle Carmody, vividly reflects how alienating the human world is to other creatures, and how pervasive and confusing. Cars are terrifying "road beasts" and trains are "road serpents", and Little Fur, the elf troll, cannot set foot on the wide, black roads, lest she break her contact with the earth, which suffocates beneath these poisonous black veins, and with the "earth magic" that assists her abilities as a healer of injured animals and trees. Most heartbreaking is the fox's, Sorrow's, tragic history at the hands of humans. This beautiful story has so much to offer that is immensely valuable and original, in its poignancy, in its portrayal of integrity and compassion and bravery within and through tragedy and cruelty and grief, and its very important underlying messages of environmentalism, respect for the earth and for all creatures, and the strength of love and hope, even through the darkest despair and loss. And the ending is wonderful! I selected this beautiful book quite randomly - partly because of the cover's gorgeous velvet nape on my edition - and I'm so impressed.