The book was a critical success and went into two editions with sale to Book-of-the-Month Club as "Talk of the Office," and translation into 13 languages.

[1] In 2010, the book was published for the first time in the UK and enjoyed a critical revival causing it to be reprinted in the United States.

[4] Following the adaptation, the book was again republished, with a new cover and the updated title of Nocturnal Animals, corresponding with the film's release.

In 1990, Susan Morrow is surprised to hear from her ex-husband, Edward, who sends her a manuscript to his novel, Nocturnal Animals.

Susan and Edward's relationship had fallen apart 25 years earlier in part thanks to him abandoning his studies to be a lawyer to pursue a writing career.

Nocturnal Animals is about a meek mathematician named Tony Hastings on his way to his country home in Maine with his wife, Laura, and teenage daughter, Helen.

On the way, they are accosted by three men in a truck, Ray, Lou, and Turk, who begin blocking the path to their car.

In retracing his steps with the state troopers, he discovers Laura and Helen, both raped and murdered, in the clearing where he had been abandoned.

Though Ray denies any knowledge of the crime, Tony feels he is mocking him and at one point is overcome with rage and hits him in the face.

However, a short time into their relationship, Edward decided that he wanted to be a writer and that the two would survive on Susan's income as a lecturer.

After Edward left for a month-long writer's retreat, Susan began an affair with their neighbor Arnold, whose wife was experiencing mental breakdowns.

[6] Director Tom Ford wrote and directed an adaptation of the book in 2016 with Amy Adams starring as Susan Morrow, Jake Gyllenhaal as Edward Sheffield/Tony Hastings, Michael Shannon as Bobby Andes, Isla Fisher as Laura Hastings, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Ray.