There's hard-edged drama, double-crossing detectives and violent murder - without any humans. Animal fiction just got dirtyWhen Chips Hardy's Each Day a Small Victory was published in 2007, it garnered some odd reviews: Shooting and Conservation magazine called it "Beatrix Potter meets the Kray Brothers" and Jake Arnott, a man who knows whereof he speaks, described it as "Pulp Fiction meets Wind in the Willows". It's animal noir, and I'm a pushover for it. In real life, "bad" animals, except maybe monkeys, aren't entertaining. But in fiction, bad animals are, paws down, much harder to resist than adorable ones. A talking dog might be winning, but he becomes even more so when what flows from his mouth is a tide ...