In the world of Zoo City, an animal arrives seemingly from nowhere immediately after the commission of each person's murderous crime, changing its host's life forever. Chapter 19 of Zoo City presents a detailed explanation of what mashavi means in this story, so you may want to read that chapter before reading the story to get a full understanding. In Christianity, the idea of spirit animals can be linked to the biblical scapegoat of Leviticus 16 and to the burden of sin carried by the protagonist in Pilgrim's Progress. According to Zimbabwean tradition, the mashavi (singular, shavi) are spirits believed to possess people and to impart skills and talents to their human hosts. This idea of animal possession is a part of several real-world mythologies. In this book, the plague of animal possession-called Aposymbiotism-dates back to the 1980s in a not-so-subtle reference to the beginning of the AIDS epidemic in Africa. Along with the animal comes a psychic talent-a shavi-different for each person. The animals serve as a constant reminder of the crime that brought them into their hosts' lives. If an animal dies, a shadowy, roaring mass called the Undertow drops down from above to engulf and obliterate its host. Animalled people must keep their animals physically close, or they will suffer terrible pain. Imagine that the scarlet letter on Hester Prynne's chest is a furry mammal-or perhaps a spider, a bird, or a reptile. This is a world in which people who commit murder immediately become permanent hosts to living animals. Set in an alternate Johannesburg, South Africa ~ Zoo City - Wikipedia World Building Setting

The book's plot focuses on Zinzi's attempts to find the missing female member of a brother-and-sister pop duo for a music producer, in return for the money she needs to fully repay her dealer. Zinzi is attempting to repay the financial debt she owes her drug dealer by charging people for her special skill of finding lost objects, as well as making use of her writing abilities by drafting 419 fraud emails. The novel's chief protagonist, Zinzi December, is a former journalist and recovering drug addict who was 'animalled' to a sloth after getting her brother killed.

Zoo City is set in an alternate version of the South African city of Johannesburg, in which people who have committed a crime are magically attached to an animal familiar – those who receive such punishment are said to be 'animalled'. To save herself, she's got to find the hardest thing of all: The truth. Alex has a talent for finding lost things.

Zoo city novel